Ecology of galaxy stellar populations from optical spectroscopic surveys

Abstract

The age and chemical composition of the stars in present-day galaxies carry important clues about their star formation processes. The latest generation of population synthesis models have allowed to derive age and stellar metallicity estimates for large samples of low-redshift galaxies. After reviewing the main results about the distribution in ages and metallicities as a function of galaxy mass, I will concentrate on recent analysis that aims at disentangling the dependences of stellar populations properties on environment and on galaxy stellar mass. Finally, new models that predict the response of the full spectrum to variations in [alpha/Fe] will allow us to derive accurate estimates of element abundance ratios and gain deeper insight into the timescales of star formation cessation.

4 pages, 1 figure, proceedings of IAUS 262 "Stellar populations: planning for the next decade"

References in corpus (4)

• Galaxy Groups in the SDSS DR4: I. The Catalogue and Basic Properties
• Ages and metallicities of early-type galaxies in the SDSS: new insight into the physical origin of the colour-magnitude and the Mg2-sigmaV relations
• Spectral models for solar-scaled and alpha-enhanced stellar populations
• Differential stellar population models: how to reliably measure [Fe/H] and [alpha/Fe] in galaxies