Characterizing the ELG luminosity functions in the nearby Universe

• Published in: Astronomy and astrophysics (Berlin) 2024-03, Vol.683, p.A46
• Main Authors: Favole, G., Gonzalez-Perez, V., Ascasibar, Y., Corcho-Caballero, P., Montero-Dorta, A. D., Benson, A. J., Comparat, J., Cora, S. A., Croton, D., Guo, H., Izquierdo-Villalba, D., Knebe, A., Orsi, Á., Stoppacher, D., Vega-Martínez, C. A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0004-6361; 1432-0746
• DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202346443

Context. Nebular emission lines are powerful diagnostics for the physical processes at play in galaxy formation and evolution. Moreover, emission-line galaxies (ELGs) are one of the main targets of current and forthcoming spectroscopic cosmological surveys. Aims. We investigate the contributions to the line luminosity functions (LFs) of different galaxy populations in the local Universe, providing a benchmark for future surveys of earlier cosmic epochs. Methods. The large statistics of the observations from the SDSS DR7 main galaxy sample and the MPA-JHU spectral catalog enabled us to precisely measure the H α , H β , [O  II ], [O  III ], and, for the first time, the [N  II ], and [S  II ] emission-line LFs over ∼2.4 Gyrs in the low- z Universe, 0.02  10 42 erg s −1 , L [O  III ] > 10 43 erg s −1 ), where the contribution of Seyfert galaxies is not negligible. In addition to the star-forming population, composite galaxies, and LINERs are the ones that contribute the most to the ELG numbers at L