SAGAbg I: A Near-Unity Mass Loading Factor in Low-Mass Galaxies via their Low-Redshift Evolution in Stellar Mass, Oxygen Abundance, and Star Formation Rate

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Main Authors: Kado-Fong, Erin, Geha, Marla, Mao, Yao-Yuan, Reyes, Mithi A. C. de los, Wechsler, Risa H., Asali, Yasmeen, Kallivayalil, Nitya, Nadler, Ethan O., Tollerud, Erik J., Weiner, Benjamin
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Kado-Fong, Erin
Geha, Marla
Mao, Yao-Yuan
Reyes, Mithi A. C. de los
Wechsler, Risa H.
Asali, Yasmeen
Kallivayalil, Nitya
Nadler, Ethan O.
Tollerud, Erik J.
Weiner, Benjamin
author_facet Kado-Fong, Erin
Geha, Marla
Mao, Yao-Yuan
Reyes, Mithi A. C. de los
Wechsler, Risa H.
Asali, Yasmeen
Kallivayalil, Nitya
Nadler, Ethan O.
Tollerud, Erik J.
Weiner, Benjamin
contents Measuring the relation between star formation and galactic winds is observationally difficult. In this work we make an indirect measurement of the mass loading factor (the ratio between mass outflow rate and star formation rate) in low-mass galaxies using a differential approach to modeling the low-redshift evolution of the star-forming main sequence and mass-metallicity relation. We use the SAGA (Satellites Around Galactic Analogs) background galaxies, those spectra observed by the SAGA survey that are not associated with the main SAGA host galaxies, to construct a sample of 11925 spectroscopically confirmed low-mass galaxies from $0.01\lesssim z \leq 0.21$ and measure a auroral line metallicity for 120 galaxies. The crux of the method is to use the lowest redshift galaxies as the boundary condition of our model, and to infer a mass-loading factor for the sample by comparing the expected evolution of the low redshift reference sample in stellar mass, gas-phase metallicity, and star formation rate against the observed properties of the sample at higher redshift. We infer a mass-loading factor of $η_{\rm m}=0.92^{+1.76}_{-0.74}$, which is in line with direct measurements of the mass-loading factor from the literature despite the drastically different set of assumptions needed for each approach. While our estimate of the mass-loading factor is in good agreement with recent galaxy simulations that focus on resolving the dynamics of the interstellar medium, it is smaller by over an order of magnitude than the mass-loading factor produced by many contemporary cosmological simulations.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2401_16469
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle SAGAbg I: A Near-Unity Mass Loading Factor in Low-Mass Galaxies via their Low-Redshift Evolution in Stellar Mass, Oxygen Abundance, and Star Formation Rate
Kado-Fong, Erin
Geha, Marla
Mao, Yao-Yuan
Reyes, Mithi A. C. de los
Wechsler, Risa H.
Asali, Yasmeen
Kallivayalil, Nitya
Nadler, Ethan O.
Tollerud, Erik J.
Weiner, Benjamin
Astrophysics of Galaxies
Measuring the relation between star formation and galactic winds is observationally difficult. In this work we make an indirect measurement of the mass loading factor (the ratio between mass outflow rate and star formation rate) in low-mass galaxies using a differential approach to modeling the low-redshift evolution of the star-forming main sequence and mass-metallicity relation. We use the SAGA (Satellites Around Galactic Analogs) background galaxies, those spectra observed by the SAGA survey that are not associated with the main SAGA host galaxies, to construct a sample of 11925 spectroscopically confirmed low-mass galaxies from $0.01\lesssim z \leq 0.21$ and measure a auroral line metallicity for 120 galaxies. The crux of the method is to use the lowest redshift galaxies as the boundary condition of our model, and to infer a mass-loading factor for the sample by comparing the expected evolution of the low redshift reference sample in stellar mass, gas-phase metallicity, and star formation rate against the observed properties of the sample at higher redshift. We infer a mass-loading factor of $η_{\rm m}=0.92^{+1.76}_{-0.74}$, which is in line with direct measurements of the mass-loading factor from the literature despite the drastically different set of assumptions needed for each approach. While our estimate of the mass-loading factor is in good agreement with recent galaxy simulations that focus on resolving the dynamics of the interstellar medium, it is smaller by over an order of magnitude than the mass-loading factor produced by many contemporary cosmological simulations.
title SAGAbg I: A Near-Unity Mass Loading Factor in Low-Mass Galaxies via their Low-Redshift Evolution in Stellar Mass, Oxygen Abundance, and Star Formation Rate
topic Astrophysics of Galaxies
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.16469