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- ItemMUSE crowded field 3D spectroscopy in NGC 300: III. Characterizing extremely faint HII regions and diffuse ionized gas(Les Ulis : EDP Sciences, 2022) Micheva, Genoveva; Roth, Martin M.; Weilbacher, Peter M.; Morisset, Christophe; Castro, Norberto; Monreal Ibero, Ana; Soemitro, Azlizan A.; Maseda, Michael V.; Steinmetz, Matthias; Brinchmann, JarleContext. There are known differences between the physical properties of H II and diffuse ionized gas (DIG). However, most of the studied regions in the literature are relatively bright, with log10 L(Hα)[erg s-1] ≳37. Aims. We compiled an extremely faint sample of 390 H II regions with a median Hα luminosity of 34.7 in the flocculent spiral galaxy NGC 300, derived their physical properties in terms of metallicity, density, extinction, and kinematics, and performed a comparative analysis of the properties of the DIG. Methods. We used MUSE data of nine fields in NGC 300, covering a galactocentric distance of zero to ~450 arcsec (~4 projected kpc), including spiral arm and inter-arm regions. We binned the data in dendrogram leaves and extracted all strong nebular emission lines. We identified H II and DIG regions and compared their electron densities, metallicity, extinction, and kinematic properties. We also tested the effectiveness of unsupervised machine-learning algorithms in distinguishing between the H II and DIG regions. Results. The gas density in the H II and DIG regions is close to the low-density limit in all fields. The average velocity dispersion in the DIG is higher than in the H II regions, which can be explained by the DIG being 1.8 kK hotter than H II gas. The DIG manifests a lower ionization parameter than H II gas, and the DIG fractions vary between 15-77%, with strong evidence of a contribution by hot low-mass evolved stars and shocks to the DIG ionization. Most of the DIG is consistent with no extinction and an oxygen metallicity that is indistinguishable from that of the H II gas. We observe a flat metallicity profile in the central region of NGC 300, without a sign of a gradient. Conclusions. The differences between extremely faint H II and DIG regions follow the same trends and correlations as their much brighter cousins. Both types of objects are so heterogeneous, however, that the differences within each class are larger than the differences between the two classes.
- ItemThe MUSE Hubble Ultra Deep Field Survey : XII. Mg II emission and absorption in star-forming galaxies(Les Ulis : EDP Sciences, 2018) Feltre, Anna; Bacon, Roland; Tresse, Laurence; Finley, Hayley; Carton, David; Blaizot, Jérémy; Bouché, Nicolas; Garel, Thibault; Inami, Hanae; Boogaard, Leindert A.; Brinchmann, Jarle; Charlot, Stéphane; Chevallard, Jacopo; Contini, Thierry; Michel-Dansac, Leo; Mahler, Guillaume; Marino, Raffaella A.; Maseda, Michael V.; Richard, Johan; Schmidt, Kasper B.; Verhamme, AnneThe physical origin of the near-ultraviolet Mg II emission remains an underexplored domain, unlike more typical emission lines that are detected in the spectra of star-forming galaxies. We explore the nebular and physical properties of a sample of 381 galaxies between 0.70 < z < 2.34 drawn from the MUSE Hubble Ultra Deep Survey. The spectra of these galaxies show a wide variety of profiles of the Mg II λλ2796, 2803 resonant doublet, from absorption to emission. We present a study on the main drivers for the detection of Mg II emission in galaxy spectra. By exploiting photoionization models, we verified that the emission-line ratios observed in galaxies with Mg II in emission are consistent with nebular emission from HII regions. From a simultaneous analysis of MUSE spectra and ancillary Hubble Space Telescope information through spectral energy distribution fitting, we find that galaxies with Mg II in emission have lower stellar masses, smaller sizes, bluer spectral slopes, and lower optical depth than those with absorption. This leads us to suggest that Mg II emission is a potential tracer of physical conditions that are not merely related to those of the ionized gas. We show that these differences in Mg II emission and absorption can be explained in terms of a higher dust and neutral gas content in the interstellar medium (ISM) of galaxies showing Mg II in absorption, which confirms the extreme sensitivity of Mg II to the presence of the neutral ISM. We conclude with an analogy between the Mg II doublet and the Ly α line that lies in their resonant nature. Further investigations with current and future facilities, including the James Webb Space Telescope, are promising because the detection of Mg II emission and its potential connection with Lyα could provide new insights into the ISM content in the early Universe.
- ItemElevated ionizing photon production efficiency in faint high-equivalent-width Lyman-α emitters(Oxford : Oxford Univ. Press, 2020) Maseda, Michael V; Bacon, Roland; Lam, Daniel; Matthee, Jorryt; Brinchmann, Jarle; Schaye, Joop; Labbe, Ivo; Schmidt, Kasper B; Boogaard, Leindert; Bouwens, Rychard; Cantalupo, Sebastiano; Franx, Marijn; Hashimoto, Takuya; Inami, Hanae; Kusakabe, Haruka; Mahler, Guillaume; Nanayakkara, Themiya; Richard, Johan; Wisotzki, LutzWhile low-luminosity galaxies dominate number counts at all redshifts, their contribution to cosmic reionization is poorly understood due to a lack of knowledge of their physical properties. We isolate a sample of 35 z ≈ 4–5 continuum-faint Lyman-α emitters from deep VLT/MUSE spectroscopy and directly measure their H α emission using stacked Spitzer/IRAC Ch. 1 photometry. Based on Hubble Space Telescope imaging, we determine that the average UV continuum magnitude is fainter than −16 (≈ 0.01 L*), implying a median Lyman-α equivalent width of 259 Å. By combining the H α measurement with the UV magnitude, we determine the ionizing photon production efficiency, ξion, a first for such faint galaxies. The measurement of log10 (ξion [Hz erg−1]) = 26.28 (+−002840) is in excess of literature measurements of both continuum- and emission line-selected samples, implying a more efficient production of ionizing photons in these lower luminosity, Lyman-α-selected systems. We conclude that this elevated efficiency can be explained by stellar populations with metallicities between 4 × 10−4 and 0.008, with light-weighted ages less than 3 Myr.