paper

The mass-metallicity relation of Lyman-break analogues and its dependence on galaxy properties

arXiv:1411.6331 · doi:10.1093/mnras/stu2184

Abstract

We investigate the mass-metallicity relation and its dependence on galaxy physical properties with a sample of 703 Lyman-break analogues (LBAs) in local Universe, which have similar properties to high redshift star-forming galaxies. The sample is selected according to $\ha$ luminosity, $L(\ha)>10^{41.8}\,{\rm erg\,s^{-1}}$, and surface brightness, $I(\ha)>10^{40.5}\,{\rm erg\,s^{-1}\,kpc^{-2}}$, criteria. The mass-metallicity relation of LBAs harmoniously agrees with that of star-forming galaxies at 1.4-1.7 in stellar mass range of . The relation between stellar mass, metallicity and star formation rate of our sample is roughly consistent with the local fundamental metallicity relation. We find that the mass-metallicity relation shows a strong correlation with the 4000Å\, break; galaxies with higher 4000Å\, break typically have higher metallicity at a fixed mass, by 0.06 dex in average. This trend is independent of the methodology of metallicity. We also use the metallicity estimated by -method to confirm it. The scatter in mass-metallicity relation can be reduced from 0.091 to 0.077 dex by a three-dimensional relation between stellar mass, metallicity and 4000Å\, break. The reduction of scatter in mass-metallicity relation suggests that the galaxy stellar age plays an important role as the second parameter in the mass-metallicity relation of LBAs.

10 pages,8 figures

References in corpus (6)

Cited by in corpus (21)