Inferring gas-phase metallicity gradients of galaxies at the seeing limit: A forward modelling approach

Abstract

We present a method to recover the gas-phase metallicity gradients from integral field spectroscopic (IFS) observations of barely resolved galaxies. We take a forward modelling approach and compare our models to the observed spatial distribution of emission line fluxes, accounting for the degrading effects of seeing and spatial binning. The method is flexible and is not limited to particular emission lines or instruments. We test the model through comparison to synthetic observations and use downgraded observations of nearby galaxies to validate this work. As a proof of concept we also apply the model to real IFS observations of high-redshift galaxies. From our testing we show that the inferred metallicity gradients and central metallicities are fairly insensitive to the assumptions made in the model and that they are reliably recovered for galaxies with sizes approximately equal to the half width at half maximum of the point-spread function. However, we also find that the presence of star forming clumps can significantly complicate the interpretation of metallicity gradients in moderately resolved high-redshift galaxies. Therefore we emphasize that care should be taken when comparing nearby well-resolved observations to high-redshift observations of partially resolved galaxies.

arXiv commentAccepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (68)

• Stellar population synthesis at the resolution of 2003
• The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Technical Summary
• Star Formation in Galaxies Along the Hubble Sequence
• The Seventh Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Global Schmidt Law in Star Forming Galaxies
• The Origin of the Mass--Metallicity Relation: Insights from 53,000 Star-Forming Galaxies in the SDSS
• The physical properties of star forming galaxies in the low redshift universe
• MultiNest: an efficient and robust Bayesian inference tool for cosmology and particle physics
• Detailed Structural Decomposition of Galaxy Images
• Theoretical Modeling of Starburst Galaxies
• Stellar Masses and Star Formation Histories for 10^5 Galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• Star Formation in AEGIS Field Galaxies since z=1.1 : The Dominance of Gradually Declining Star Formation, and the Main Sequence of Star-Forming Galaxies
• The Star Formation Law in Nearby Galaxies on Sub-Kpc Scales
• A Simple Model for the Absorption of Starlight by Dust in Galaxies
• Multimodal nested sampling: an efficient and robust alternative to MCMC methods for astronomical data analysis
• X-ray spectral modelling of the AGN obscuring region in the CDFS: Bayesian model selection and catalogue
• Galactic Winds
• Metallicity Calibrations and the Mass-Metallicity Relation for Star-Forming Galaxies
• 3D-HST+CANDELS: The Evolution of the Galaxy Size-Mass Distribution since $z=3$
• Adaptive spatial binning of integral-field spectroscopic data using Voronoi tessellations
• CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey: I. Survey presentation
• The ages and metallicities of galaxies in the local universe
• Using Strong Lines to Estimate Abundances in Extragalactic HII Regions and Starburst Galaxies
• The Hubble Deep Field: Observations, Data Reduction, and Galaxy Photometry
• AMAZE. I. The evolution of the mass-metallicity relation at z>3
• Importance Nested Sampling and the MultiNest Algorithm
• A Study of the Gas-Star Formation Relation over Cosmic Time
• PHIBSS: molecular gas content and scaling relations in z~1-3 normal star forming galaxies
• HyperLEDA. III. The catalogue of extragalactic distances
• The MUSE second-generation VLT instrument
• Gas-regulation of galaxies: the evolution of the cosmic sSFR, the metallicity-mass-SFR relation and the stellar content of haloes
• Constraining the Low-Mass Slope of the Star Formation Sequence at 0.5<z<2.5
• The Impact of cold gas accretion above a mass floor on galaxy scaling relations
• Optical Spectroscopy and Nebular Oxygen Abundances of the Spitzer/SINGS Galaxies
• An Analytic Model for the Evolution of the Stellar, Gas, and Metal Content of Galaxies
• A characteristic oxygen abundance gradient in galaxy disks unveiled with CALIFA
• Theoretical Evolution of Optical Strong Lines across Cosmic Time
• The Origin and Evolution of the Galaxy Mass-Metallicity Relation
• New Strong Line Abundance Diagnostics for \HII Regions: Effects of $\kappa$-Distributed Electron Energies and New Atomic Data
• CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey: IV. Third Public data release
• The Spitzer Survey of Stellar Structure in Galaxies (S${}^4$G): Precise Stellar Mass Distributions from Automated Dust Correction at 3.6 microns
• CALIFA: a diameter-selected sample for an integral field spectroscopy galaxy survey
• Metallicity evolution, metallicity gradients and gas fractions at z~3.4
• Gas accretion as the origin of chemical abundance gradients in distant galaxies
• Galaxy Mergers and the Mass-Metallicity Relation: Evidence for Nuclear Metal Dilution and Flattened Gradients from Numerical Simulations
• The MUSE 3D view of the Hubble Deep Field South
• Metallicity gradients in local field star-forming galaxies: Insights on inflows, outflows, and the coevolution of gas, stars and metals
• Adaptive Binning of X-ray data with Weighted Voronoi Tesselations
• Resolving the electron temperature discrepancies in HII Regions and Planetary Nebulae: kappa-distributed electrons
• The DiskMass Survey. VII. The distribution of luminous and dark matter in spiral galaxies
• The Origin and Evolution of Metallicity Gradients: Probing the Mode of Mass Assembly at z=2
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): autoz spectral redshift measurements, confidence and errors
• MASSIV: Mass Assembly Survey with SINFONI in VVDS. III. Evidence for positive metallicity gradients in z~1.2 star-forming galaxies
• Modelling the Pan-Spectral Energy Distribution of Starburst Galaxies: II. Control of the \HII Region Parameters
• An Integral Field Study of Abundance Gradients in Nearby LIRGs
• Spatially-resolved dust maps from Balmer decrements in galaxies at z~1.4
• KMOS^3D: Dynamical constraints on the mass budget in early star-forming disks
• A relationship between specific star formation rate and metallicity gradient within z=1 galaxies from KMOS-HiZELS
• A Keck Survey of Gravitationally-Lensed Star-Forming Galaxies: High Spatial Resolution Studies of Kinematics and Metallicity Gradients
• PPAK Wide-field Integral Field Spectroscopy of NGC 628: I. The largest spectroscopic mosaic on a single galaxy
• Stars were born in significantly denser regions in the early Universe
• The effects of spatial resolution on Integral Field Spectrograph surveys at different redshifts. The CALIFA perspective
• Systematics in Metallicity Gradient Measurements I : Angular Resolution, Signal-to-Noise and Annuli Binning
• Estimating gas masses and dust-to-gas ratios from optical spectroscopy
• Abundance gradients in spiral disks: is the gradient inversion at high redshift real?
• A rise in the ionizing photons in star-forming galaxies over the past 5 billion years
• Deep MUSE observations in the HDFS. Morpho-kinematics of distant star-forming galaxies down to $10^8$M${}_{\odot }$
• The Gini Coefficient as a Tool for Image Family Idenitification in Strong Lensing Systems with Multiple Images

Cited by in corpus (28)

• The MUSE Hubble Ultra Deep Field Survey: I. Survey description, data reduction and source detection
• The SINS/zC-SINF survey of z~2 galaxy kinematics: SINFONI adaptive optics-assisted data and kiloparsec-scale emission line properties
• The JWST Extragalactic Mock Catalog: Modeling galaxy populations from the UV through the near-IR over thirteen billion years of cosmic history
• JADES: Probing interstellar medium conditions at $z\sim 5.5-9.5$ with ultra-deep JWST/NIRSpec spectroscopy
• Synthetic nebular emission from massive galaxies I: origin of the cosmic evolution of optical emission-line ratios
• Physical properties and H-ionizing-photon production rates of extreme nearby star-forming regions
• First Sample of H$\alpha$+[O III] $\lambda$5007 Line Emitters at $z>6$ Through JWST/NIRCam Slitless Spectroscopy: Physical Properties and Line Luminosity Functions
• The physics of gas phase metallicity gradients in galaxies
• High-z galaxies with JWST and local analogues -- it is not only star formation
• CLEAR: The Gas-Phase Metallicity Gradients of Star-Forming Galaxies at 0.6 < z < 2.6
• Modelling ultraviolet-line diagnostics of stars, the ionized and the neutral interstellar medium in star-forming galaxies
• First gas-phase metallicity gradients of $0.1\lesssim z\lesssim 0.8$ galaxies with MUSE
• New AGN diagnostic diagrams based on the [OIII]$\lambda 4363$ auroral line
• Simulating and interpreting deep observations in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field with the JWST/NIRSpec low-resolution 'prism'
• Deep Realistic Extragalactic Model (DREaM) Galaxy Catalogs: Predictions for a Roman Ultra-Deep Field
• Quantifying the effects of spatial resolution and noise on galaxy metallicity gradients
• HOMERUN a new approach to photoionization modelling. I -- reproducing observed emission lines with percent accuracy and obtaining accurate physical properties of the ionized gas
• The Evolution of Gas-Phase Metallicity and Resolved Abundances in Star-forming Galaxies at $z\approx 0.6-1.8$
• SDSS-IV MaNGA: Evidence for enriched accretion onto satellite galaxies in dense environments
• Resolved scaling relations and metallicity gradients on sub-kiloparsec scales at z=1
• Bayesian hierarchical modelling of the ${\mathrm{M}}_{\star }$-SFR relation from 1<z<6 in ASTRODEEP
• The role of gas kinematics in setting metallicity gradients at high redshift
• On the Simultaneous Modelling of Dust and Stellar Populations for Interpretation of Galaxy Properties
• Abundant Serendipitous Emission Line Sources with JWST/NIRSpec
• Euclid preparation. Optical emission-line predictions of intermediate-z galaxy populations in GAEA for the Euclid Deep and Wide Surveys
• The internal metallicity distributions of simulated galaxies from EAGLE, Illustris, and IllustrisTNG at z=1.8-4 as probed by Gamma Ray Burst hosts
• A Comprehensive Analysis on the Nature of the Spiral Arms in NGC 3686, NGC 4321, and NGC 2403
• KURVS: chemical properties from multiple strong line calibrations for star-forming galaxies at $z\sim 1.5$