The MASSIVE Survey - I. A Volume-Limited Integral-Field Spectroscopic Study of the Most Massive Early-Type Galaxies within 108 Mpc

Abstract

Massive early-type galaxies represent the modern-day remnants of the earliest major star formation episodes in the history of the universe. These galaxies are central to our understanding of the evolution of cosmic structure, stellar populations, and supermassive black holes, but the details of their complex formation histories remain uncertain. To address this situation, we have initiated the MASSIVE Survey, a volume-limited, multi-wavelength, integral-field spectroscopic (IFS) and photometric survey of the structure and dynamics of the ~100 most massive early-type galaxies within a distance of 108 Mpc. This survey probes a stellar mass range M* > 10^{11.5} Msun and diverse galaxy environments that have not been systematically studied to date. Our wide-field IFS data cover about two effective radii of individual galaxies, and for a subset of them, we are acquiring additional IFS observations on sub-arcsecond scales with adaptive optics. We are also acquiring deep K-band imaging to trace the extended halos of the galaxies and measure accurate total magnitudes. Dynamical orbit modeling of the combined data will allow us to simultaneously determine the stellar, black hole, and dark matter halo masses. The primary goals of the project are to constrain the black hole scaling relations at high masses, investigate systematically the stellar initial mass function and dark matter distribution in massive galaxies, and probe the late-time assembly of ellipticals through stellar population and kinematical gradients. In this paper, we describe the MASSIVE sample selection, discuss the distinct demographics and structural and environmental properties of the selected galaxies, and provide an overview of our basic observational program, science goals and early survey results.

19 pages, 14 figures. ApJ (2014) vol. 795, in press

References in corpus (26)

• Heating Hot Atmospheres with Active Galactic Nuclei
• A systematic variation of the stellar initial mass function in early-type galaxies
• The Black Hole Mass, Stellar M/L, and Dark Halo in M87
• How Mergers May Affect The Mass Scaling Relations Between Black Holes, Galaxies, and Other Gravitationally Bound Systems
• CALIFA: a diameter-selected sample for an integral field spectroscopy galaxy survey
• An Over-Massive Black Hole in the Compact Lenticular Galaxy NGC1277
• Radial variations in the stellar initial mass function of early-type galaxies
• Dynamical modelling of luminous and dark matter in 17 Coma early-type galaxies
• Dynamical masses of early-type galaxies at z~2: Are they truly superdense?
• Measuring Ages and Elemental Abundances from Unresolved Stellar Populations: Fe, Mg, C, N, and Ca
• Dissecting the Red Sequence--I. Star Formation Histories of Quiescent Galaxies: The Color-Magnitude vs. the Color-Sigma Relation
• Dissipationless Mergers of Elliptical Galaxies and the Evolution of the Fundamental Plane
• Ages and Abundances of Red Sequence Galaxies as a Function of LINER Emission Line Strength
• The stellar velocity dispersion of a compact massive galaxy at z=1.80 using X-Shooter: confirmation of the evolution in the mass-size and mass-dispersion relations
• Variations in the initial mass function in early-type galaxies: A critical comparison between dynamical and spectroscopic results
• The SLUGGS survey: Exploring the metallicity gradients of nearby early-type galaxies to large radii
• Multiaperture $UBVRIzJHK$ Photometry of Galaxies in the Coma Cluster
• Bulge and Halo Kinematics Across the Hubble Sequence
• Filamentary Star Formation in NGC 1275
• Line Strengths in Early-Type Cluster Galaxies at z=0.33: Implications for alpha/Fe, Nitrogen and the Histories of E/S0s
• Surface Brightness Fluctuations from archival ACS images: a stellar population and distance study
• The Hot Interstellar Medium in Normal Elliptical Galaxies. II. Morphological Evidence for AGN Feedback
• The Stellar Haloes of Massive Elliptical Galaxies III: Kinematics at Large Radius
• The dark haloes of early-type galaxies in low-density environments: XMM-Newton and Chandra observations of NGC 57, NGC 7796 and IC 1531
• Large scatter in X-ray emission among elliptical galaxies: correlations with mass of host halo
• The diverse X-ray properties of four truly isolated elliptical galaxies: NGC 2954, NGC 6172, NGC 7052, and NGC 7785

Cited by in corpus (102)

• Overview of the SDSS-IV MaNGA Survey: Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory
• The cold interstellar medium of galaxies in the Local Universe
• The SAGES Legacy Unifying Globulars and GalaxieS Survey (SLUGGS): Sample definition, methods, and initial results
• The Local Nanohertz Gravitational-Wave Landscape From Supermassive Black Hole Binaries
• The Hubble Constant from Infrared Surface Brightness Fluctuation Distances
• Cosmicflows-4
• The MASSIVE Survey - V. Spatially-Resolved Stellar Angular Momentum, Velocity Dispersion, and Higher Moments of the 41 Most Massive Local Early-Type Galaxies
• Hot Atmospheres, Cold Gas, AGN Feedback and the Evolution of Early Type Galaxies: a Topical Perspective
• Scaling Properties of Galaxy Groups
• Two new confirmed massive relic galaxies: red nuggets in the present-day Universe
• The MASSIVE Survey - VIII. Stellar Velocity Dispersion Profiles and Environmental Dependence of Early-Type Galaxies
• The SAMI Galaxy Survey: Revising the Fraction of Slow Rotators in IFS Galaxy Surveys
• The Fornax Deep Survey with VST. VIII. Connecting the accretion history with the cluster density
• The Circum-Galactic Medium of MASsive Spirals II: Probing the Nature of Hot Gaseous Halo around the Most Massive Isolated Spiral Galaxies
• Toward determining the number of observable supermassive black hole shadows
• The MASSIVE survey - XI. What drives the molecular gas properties of early-type galaxies
• On the evolution of galaxy spin in a cosmological hydrodynamic simulation of galaxy clusters
• Black Hole Mass Measurements of Radio Galaxies NGC 315 and NGC 4261 Using ALMA CO Observations
• The Fornax3D project: Tracing the assembly history of the cluster from the kinematic and line-strength maps
• The CALIFA view on stellar angular momentum across the Hubble sequence
• The origin and properties of massive prolate galaxies in the Illustris simulation
• Spatially resolved variations of the IMF mass normalisation in early-type galaxies as probed by molecular gas kinematics
• The SAMI Galaxy Survey: The internal orbital structure and mass distribution of passive galaxies from triaxial orbit-superposition Schwarzschild models
• The diverse nature and formation paths of slow rotator galaxies in the EAGLE simulations
• Strong lensing signatures of luminous structure and substructure in early-type galaxies
• The MAGPI Survey -- science goals, design, observing strategy, early results and theoretical framework
• WISDOM Project -- X. The morphology of the molecular ISM in galaxy centres and its dependence on galaxy structure
• Infrared Surface Brightness Fluctuation Distances for MASSIVE and Type Ia Supernova Host Galaxies
• X-shooter Spectroscopy and HST Imaging of 15 Ultra Massive Quiescent Galaxies at $z\gtrsim 2$
• Resolved Multi-element Stellar Chemical Abundances in the Brightest Quiescent Galaxy at z $\sim$ 2
• The MASSIVE Survey - XII Connecting Stellar Populations of Early-Type Galaxies to Kinematics and Environment
• Integral-field kinematics and stellar populations of early-type galaxies out to three half-light radii
• Probing the kinematic morphology-density relation of early-type galaxies with MaNGA
• The descendants of the first quasars in the BlueTides simulation
• Two channels of supermassive black hole growth as seen on the galaxies mass-size plane
• The MASSIVE SURVEY XVI. The Stellar Initial Mass Function in the Center of MASSIVE Early-Type Galaxies
• The SAMI Galaxy Survey: stellar population gradients of central galaxies
• Kinematics of Simulated Galaxies II: Probing the Stellar Kinematics of Galaxies out to Large Radii
• The NANOGrav 11yr Data Set: Limits on Supermassive Black Hole Binaries in Galaxies within 500Mpc
• The Contribution of In-situ and Ex-situ Star Formation in Early-Type Galaxies: MaNGA versus IllustrisTNG
• SDSS-IV MaNGA: Uncovering the Angular Momentum Content of Central and Satellite Early-type Galaxies
• The accretion histories of brightest cluster galaxies from their stellar population gradients
• Recovering stellar population parameters via different population models and stellar libraries
• The MASSIVE Survey -- XV. A Stellar Dynamical Mass Measurement of the Supermassive Black Hole in Massive Elliptical Galaxy NGC 1453
• The MASSIVE Survey VI: The Spatial Distribution and Kinematics of Warm Ionized Gas in the Most Massive Local Early-type Galaxies
• Connecting Infrared Surface Brightness Fluctuation Distances to Type Ia Supernova Hosts: Testing the Top Rung of the Distance Ladder
• Triaxial Orbit-based Dynamical Modeling of Galaxies with Supermassive Black Holes and an Application to Massive Elliptical Galaxy NGC 1453
• Rotation Curves of Galaxies and Their Dependence on Morphology and Stellar Mass
• WISDOM Project -- VII. Molecular gas measurement of the supermassive black hole mass in NGC 7052
• The Breakthrough Listen Search for Intelligent Life: Technosignature Search of 97 Nearby Galaxies
• Non-parametric Triaxial Deprojection of Elliptical Galaxies
• Evidence for Impact of Galaxy Mergers on Stellar Kinematics of Early-type Galaxies
• The MASSIVE Survey -- XVII. A Triaxial Orbit-based Determination of the Black Hole Mass and Intrinsic Shape of Elliptical Galaxy NGC 2693
• Prospects for Recovering Galaxy Intrinsic Shapes from Projected Quantities
• Modelling the accretion and feedback of supermassive black hole binaries in gas-rich galaxy mergers
• The SAMI Galaxy Survey: Environmental analysis of the orbital structures of passive galaxies
• Merger histories of brightest group galaxies from MUSE stellar kinematics
• Mapping Accreted Stars in Early-Type Galaxies Across the Mass-Size Plane
• The halo of M105 and its group environment as traced by planetary nebula populations: I. Wide-field photometric survey of planetary nebulae in the Leo I group
• Disc cloaking: Establishing a lower limit to the number density of local compact massive spheroids/bulges and the potential fate of some high-z red nuggets
• The MASSIVE Survey XIII -- Spatially Resolved Stellar Kinematics in the Central 1 kpc of 20 Massive Elliptical Galaxies with the GMOS-North Integral-Field Spectrograph
• The Complete Local Volume Groups Sample -- IV. Star formation and gas content in group-dominant galaxies
• A Study of Central Galaxy Rotation with Stellar Mass and Environment
• Exploring the High-Mass End of the Stellar Mass Function of Star Forming Galaxies at Cosmic Noon
• A search for ionised gas outflows in an Halpha imaging atlas of nearby LINERs
• The assembly history of the nearest S0 galaxy NGC 3115 from its kinematics out to six half-light radii
• The role of AGN on the structure, kinematics and evolution of ETGs in the Horizon simulations
• A Precise Benchmark for Cluster Scaling Relations: Fundamental Plane, Mass Plane and IMF in the Coma Cluster from Dynamical Models
• Dynamical modelling and origin of gas turbulence in z $\sim$ 4.5 galaxies
• The Fornax3D project: The assembly history of massive early-type galaxies in the Fornax cluster from deep imaging and integral field spectroscopy
• On the assembly history of massive galaxies. A pilot project with VEGAS deep imaging and M3G integral field spectroscopy
• X-Ray Shapes of Elliptical Galaxies and Implications for Self-Interacting Dark Matter
• Larger ${\lambda }_R$ in the disc of isolated active spiral galaxies than in their non-active twins
• The Unusually High Halo Concentration of the Fossil Group NGC 6482: Evidence for Weak Adiabatic Contraction
• Spatially-resolved stellar populations and kinematics with KCWI: probing the assembly history of the massive early-type galaxy NGC 1407
• Optical emission lines in the most massive galaxies: morphology, kinematics and ionisation properties
• Temperature Profiles of Hot Gas In Early Type Galaxies
• Classifying the formation processes of S0 galaxies using Convolutional Neural Networks
• Impact of Galaxy Mergers on Stellar Population Profiles of Early-type Galaxies
• Fast Rotators at Cosmic Noon: Stellar Kinematics for 15 Quiescent Galaxies from JWST-SUSPENSE
• The MASSIVE survey -- XIX. Molecular gas measurements of the supermassive black hole masses in the elliptical galaxies NGC 1684 and NGC 0997
• RABBITS -- II. The impact of AGN feedback on coalescing supermassive black holes in disc and elliptical galaxy mergers
• Ubiquitous signs of interactions in early-type galaxies with prolate rotation
• Recovery of the low- and high-mass end slopes of the IMF in massive early-type galaxies using detailed elemental abundances
• The Fundamental Plane of Massive Quiescent Galaxies at z~2
• 2D Surface Brightness Modelling of Large 2MASS Galaxies I: Photometry and Structural Parameters
• Early-type galaxy density profiles from IllustrisTNG: III. Effects on outer kinematic structure
• The metallicity and elemental abundance maps of kinematically atypical galaxies for constraining minor merger and accretion histories
• The Initial Mass Function and Other Stellar Properties Across the Core of the Hydra I Cluster
• Globular Cluster Ultraluminous X-ray Sources in the Furthest Early-Type Galaxies
• Exploring Dark Forces with Multimessenger Studies of Extreme Mass Ratio Inspirals
• Signatures of Massive Black Hole Merger Host Galaxies from Cosmological Simulations II: Unique Stellar Kinematics in Integral Field Unit Spectroscopy
• Inferring Mbh-Mbulge Evolution from the Gravitational Wave Background
• The unusually high dark matter concentration of the galaxy group NGC 1600
• Detecting Intermediate-Mass Black Holes out to 20 Mpc with ELT/HARMONI: The Case of FCC 119
• On the Origin of the Variety of Velocity Dispersion Profiles of Galaxies
• The SLUGGS survey: a new mask design to reconstruct the stellar populations and kinematics of both inner and outer galaxy regions
• Virial models and Anisotropy of Velocity Dispersion in e-galaxies
• Multi-spin stellar velocity maps of the most massive galaxies
• The Next Generation Virgo Cluster Survey (NGVS). XL. The Morphological Classification of Virgo Cluster Galaxies
• TONGS: A Treasury Of Nearby Galaxy Surveys
• Stellar Abundances at the Center of Early Type Galaxies with Fine Structure