ON THE LIMITS OF MEASURING THE BULGE AND DISK PROPERTIES OF LOCAL AND HIGH-REDSHIFT MASSIVE GALAXIES

ABSTRACT A considerable fraction of the massive quiescent galaxies at z 2, which are known to be much more compact than galaxies of comparable mass today, appear to have a disk. How well can we measure the bulge and disk properties of these systems? We simulate two-component model galaxies in order...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Astrophysical journal 2016-06, Vol.824 (2), p.112-112
Main Authors: Davari, Roozbeh, Ho, Luis C., Peng, Chien Y.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Compact disks
Compact galaxies
Disks
Galactic bulge
Galaxies
galaxies: bulge
galaxies: formation
galaxies: photometry
galaxies: structure
Galaxy: disk
Red shift
Robustness
Simulation
surveys
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:ABSTRACT A considerable fraction of the massive quiescent galaxies at z 2, which are known to be much more compact than galaxies of comparable mass today, appear to have a disk. How well can we measure the bulge and disk properties of these systems? We simulate two-component model galaxies in order to systematically quantify the effects of non-homology in structures and the methods employed. We employ empirical scaling relations to produce realistic-looking local galaxies with a uniform and wide range of bulge-to-total ratios (B/T), and then rescale them to mimic the signal-to-noise ratios and sizes of observed galaxies at z 2. This provides the most complete set of simulations to date for which we can examine the robustness of two-component decomposition of compact disk galaxies at different B/T. We confirm that the size of these massive, compact galaxies can be measured robustly using a single Sérsic fit. We can measure B/T accurately without imposing any constraints on the light profile shape of the bulge, but, due to the small angular sizes of bulges at high redshift, their detailed properties can only be recovered for galaxies with B/T 0.2. The disk component, by contrast, can be measured with little difficulty.
ISSN:0004-637X
1538-4357
DOI:10.3847/0004-637X/824/2/112