SUPERDENSE MASSIVE GALAXIES IN THE NEARBY UNIVERSE

By Ignacio Trujillo, A. Cenarro, A. D. Lorenzo-Cáceres, A. Vazdekis, I. G. D. L. Rosa, A. Cava. Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union, 2009

141 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Superdense massive galaxies (re ∼ 1 kpc; M ∼ 1011 M☉) were common in the early universe (z ≳ 1.5). Within some hierarchical merging scenarios, a non-negligible fraction (1%–10%) of these galaxies is expected to survive since that epoch, retaining their compactness and presenting old stellar populations in the present universe. Using the NYU Value-Added Galaxy Catalog from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6, we find only a tiny fraction of galaxies (∼0.03%) with re ≲ 1.5 kpc and M⋆ ≳ 8 × 1010 M☉ in the local universe (z < 0.2). Surprisingly, they are relatively young (∼2 Gyr) and metal-rich ([Z/H] ∼0.2). The consequences of these findings within the current two competing size evolution scenarios for the most massive galaxies (“dry” mergers vs. “puffing up” due to quasar activity) are discussed.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9bbb83265c57d3ea9f290aaf5374e5285c81e352

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In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. M. Cappellari
2. P. Hopkins
3. P. V. van Dokkum
4. L. Hernquist
5. T. Naab
6. M. Franx
7. C. Conroy
8. R. Somerville

In Instrumentation

1. M. Cappellari
2. P. V. van Dokkum
3. P. Hopkins
4. L. Hernquist
5. M. Franx
6. T. Naab
7. C. Conroy
8. Richard S. Ellis

Citations in the corpus

• STELLAR KINEMATICS OF z ∼ 2 GALAXIES AND THE INSIDE-OUT GROWTH OF QUIESCENT GALAXIES, (2012, background): “Searches for ultra-dense low-redshift counterparts by Trujillo et al. (2009) and Taylor et al. (2010a) found only a handful of compact sources atz ∼ 0, which have relatively young stellar populations (Trujillo et al. 2009; Ferré-Mateu et al. 2012).”
• 3D-HST+CANDELS: THE EVOLUTION OF THE GALAXY SIZE–MASS DISTRIBUTION SINCE z = 3 (2014, unknown): “…exists within present-day clusters, with a number density comparable to that of higher-redshift early-type galaxies (Valentinuzzi et al. 2010; Poggianti et al. 2013); tension with the absence of such galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) remains (Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010).”
• THE COSMOLOGICAL SIZE AND VELOCITY DISPERSION EVOLUTION OF MASSIVE EARLY-TYPE GALAXIES (2011, background): “This confirms previous suggestions motivated by the dearth of compact galaxies in the nearby Universe, that a highly stochastical process like major mergers cannot be the main driver for the observed size evolution (Bezanson et al. 2009; Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010).”
• SUPERDENSE GALAXIES AND THE MASS–SIZE RELATION AT LOW REDSHIFT (2012, methodology): “Trujillo et al. (2009) searched for galaxies withM⋆ > 8× 1010 and Re ≤ 1.5 kpc in the Sloan at 0< z< 0.2 using NYUVAC radii and mass measurements.”
• THE EVOLVING RELATIONS BETWEEN SIZE, MASS, SURFACE DENSITY, AND STAR FORMATION IN 3 × 104 GALAXIES SINCE z = 2 (2009, background): “This re-illustrates the phenomenon pointed out by van Dokkum et al. (2008), Trujillo et al. (2009), and Taylor et al. (2009b), but with multiple redshift bins the depletion of these galaxies is now easily seen.”
• THE GROWTH OF MASSIVE GALAXIES SINCE z = 2 (2009, result): “This also seems to hold at low redshift: Taylor et al. (2009) find that galaxies in SDSS that are more compact tend to have higher velocity dispersions, although we note that Trujillo et al. (2009) do not see the same trend in their analysis of SDSS daa.”
• The Morphologies of Massive Galaxies at 1<z<3 in the CANDELS-UDS Field: Compact Bulges, and the Rise and Fall of Massive Disks (2012, background): “Moreover, several local studies have now clarified the relative dearth of comparably compact systems surviving to the present day (Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010), strengthening the argument that the compact high-redshift systems must undergo a period of significant size evolution…”
• Compact high-redshift galaxies are the cores of the most massive present-day spheroids (2009, background): “5 shows that there is ∼4 × 107 M Mpc−3 of stellar mass in >1011 M ellipticals, above a surface density threshold of > 1010 M kpc−2 in the local Universe.”
• SUPERDENSE MASSIVE GALAXIES IN WINGS LOCAL CLUSTERS (2009, background): “Trujillo et al. (2009) search for SDGs with M∗ ≥ 8×1010M⊙ and Re ≤ 1.5kpc, and found no candidates with old luminosity-weighted ages, and very few of all ages.”
• How do minor mergers promote inside-out growth of ellipticals, transforming the size, density profile and dark matter fraction? (2012, background): “Another argument against major mergers driving the size evolution is the apparent absence (or very low number) of massive compact galaxies in the present day universe (Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010).”
• Dissecting the size evolution of elliptical galaxies since z∼ 1: puffing-up versus minor-merging scenarios (2011, background): “According to that model, in the present Universe, the contribution of the dark matter halo on settling the velocity dispersion of the galaxies will be higher than in the past.”
• Discriminating Between the Physical Processes that Drive Spheroid Size Evolution (2009, background): “That being said, there does not appear to be a ‘relic’ population of high-mass, very compact spheroids (see e.g. Trujillo et al. 2009).”
• SIZES AND SURFACE BRIGHTNESS PROFILES OF QUIESCENT GALAXIES AT z ∼ 2 (2011, background): “It is unclear what the structure of the progenitors of these galaxies is, and the lack of extremely compact massive galaxies at low redshift implies considerable size evolution betweenz = 2 and z = 0 (Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010).”
• THE SLOAN LENS ACS SURVEY. X. STELLAR, DYNAMICAL, AND TOTAL MASS CORRELATIONS OF MASSIVE EARLY-TYPE GALAXIES (2010, background): “Secondly, SDSS has finite resolution and thus ultra-compact galaxies are difficult to identify (e.g., Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2009; Stockton et al. 2010).”
• ON THE DEARTH OF COMPACT, MASSIVE, RED SEQUENCE GALAXIES IN THE LOCAL UNIVERSE (2009, background): “Finally, in §5, we compare our results to a similar studies by Trujillo et al. (2009) and Valentinuzzi et al. (2009), and briefly examine the properties of our compact galaxies’ stellar populations in comparison to the general z ∼ 0.1 red sequence galaxy population.”
• The ATLAS3D project – I. A volume-limited sample of 260 nearby early-type galaxies: science goals and selection criteria (2010, result): “Consistently with other larger local galaxy samples (van Dokkum et al. 2008; Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010), we find no massive and superdense (LK >∼ 10 11 L⊙,K and Re <∼ 2 kpc) ETGs in our parent sample, contrary to what is found from photometry of ETGs at redshiftz >∼ 1.5 (e.g. Daddi…”
• CAN MINOR MERGING ACCOUNT FOR THE SIZE GROWTH OF QUIESCENT GALAXIES? NEW RESULTS FROM THE CANDELS SURVEY (2011, background): “Although there may be a few compact systems persisting even to z = 0 (Valentinuzzi et al. 2010), their comoving number density is clearly greatly depleted (Trujillo et al. 2009; Taylor et al. 2010).”