A consistent measure of the merger histories of massive galaxies using close-pair statistics I: Major mergers at $z<3.5$

Abstract

We use a large sample of $\sim 350,000$ galaxies constructed by combining the UKIDSS UDS, VIDEO/CFHT-LS, UltraVISTA/COSMOS and GAMA survey regions to probe the major merging histories of massive galaxies ($>10^{10}{\mathrm{M}}_{\odot }$) at $0.005<z<3.5$. We use a method adapted from that presented in Lopez-Sanjuan et al. (2014) using the full photometric redshift probability distributions, to measure pair $\text{fractions}$ of flux-limited, stellar mass selected galaxy samples using close-pair statistics. The pair fraction is found to weakly evolve as $\propto (1+z{)}^{0.8}$ with no dependence on stellar mass. We subsequently derive major merger $\text{rates}$ for galaxies at $>10^{10}{\mathrm{M}}_{\odot }$ and at a constant number density of $n>10^{-4}$ Mpc${}^{-3}$, and find rates a factor of 2-3 smaller than previous works, although this depends strongly on the assumed merger timescale and likelihood of a close-pair merging. Galaxies undergo approximately 0.5 major mergers at $z<3.5$, accruing an additional 1-4 $\times 10^{10}{\mathrm{M}}_{\odot }$ in the process. Major merger accretion rate densities of $\sim 2\times 10^{-4}$ ${\mathrm{M}}_{\odot }$ yr${}^{-1}$ Mpc${}^{-3}$ are found for number density selected samples, indicating that direct progenitors of local massive ($>10^{11}{\mathrm{M}}_{\odot }$) galaxies have experienced a steady supply of stellar mass via major mergers throughout their evolution. While pair fractions are found to agree with those predicted by the Henriques et al. (2014) semi-analytic model, the Illustris hydrodynamical simulation fails to quantitatively reproduce derived merger rates. Furthermore, we find major mergers become a comparable source of stellar mass growth compared to star-formation at $z<1$, but is 10-100 times smaller than the SFR density at higher redshifts.

arXiv comment26 pages, 18 figures, accepted to MNRAS

References in corpus (124)

• Astropy: A Community Python Package for Astronomy
• Stellar population synthesis at the resolution of 2003
• Galactic Stellar and Substellar Initial Mass Function
• Star Formation in Galaxies Along the Hubble Sequence
• Planck 2013 results. XVI. Cosmological parameters
• The Dust Content and Opacity of Actively Star-Forming Galaxies
• Simulating the joint evolution of quasars, galaxies and their large-scale distribution
• Cosmic Star Formation History
• The many lives of active galactic nuclei: cooling flows, black holes and the luminosities and colours of galaxies
• The EAGLE project: Simulating the evolution and assembly of galaxies and their environments
• The UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey (UKIDSS)
• The Galaxy Evolution Explorer: A Space Ultraviolet Survey Mission
• Introducing the Illustris Project: Simulating the coevolution of dark and visible matter in the Universe
• The Cosmic Evolution Survey (COSMOS) -- Overview
• Evolutionary population synthesis: models, analysis of the ingredients and application to high-z galaxies
• EAZY: A Fast, Public Photometric Redshift Code
• The hierarchical formation of the brightest cluster galaxies
• Physical Models of Galaxy Formation in a Cosmological Framework
• 3D-HST+CANDELS: The Evolution of the Galaxy Size-Mass Distribution since $z=3$
• Properties of galaxies reproduced by a hydrodynamic simulation
• COSMOS Photometric Redshifts with 30-bands for 2-deg2
• From dwarf spheroidals to cDs: Simulating the galaxy population in a LCDM cosmology
• Bayesian photometric redshift estimation
• The COSMOS2015 Catalog: Exploring the 1<z<6 Universe with half a million galaxies
• Interpreting the Cosmic Infrared Background: Constraints on the Evolution of the Dust Enshrouded Star Formation Rate
• Introducing the Illustris Project: the evolution of galaxy populations across cosmic time
• Mass assembly in quiescent and star-forming galaxies since z=4 from UltraVISTA
• zCOSMOS: A Large VLT/VIMOS redshift survey covering 0 < z < 3 in the COSMOS field
• The Evolution of the Stellar Mass Functions of Star-Forming and Quiescent Galaxies to z = 4 from the COSMOS/UltraVISTA Survey
• Passively Evolving Early-type Galaxies at 1.4<z<2.5 in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field
• A New Non-Parametric Approach to Galaxy Morphological Classification
• UltraVISTA: a new ultra-deep near-infrared survey in COSMOS
• The First Release COSMOS Optical and Near-IR Data and Catalog
• The merger rate of galaxies in the Illustris Simulation: a comparison with observations and semi-empirical models
• Galaxy Stellar Mass Assembly between 0.2<z<2 from the S-COSMOS survey
• Galaxy formation in the Planck Cosmology - I. Matching the observed evolution of star formation rates, colours and stellar masses
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly: Stellar Mass Estimates
• The Spitzer Legacy Survey of the HST-ACS 2 sq. deg. COSMOS Field: survey strategy and first analysis
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): end of survey report and data release 2
• Evolution of structure in cold dark matter universes
• A Direct Measurement of Major Galaxy Mergers at z < 3
• Strong size evolution of the most massive galaxies since z~2
• Towards an understanding of the rapid decline of the cosmic star formation rate
• The stellar mass assembly of galaxies in the Illustris simulation: growth by mergers and the spatial distribution of accreted stars
• zCOSMOS - 10k-bright spectroscopic sample. The bimodality in the Galaxy Stellar Mass Function: exploring its evolution with redshift
• The Evolution of Galaxy Mergers and Morphology at z<1.2 in the Extended Groth Strip
• Can Minor Merging Account for the Size Growth of Quiescent Galaxies? New Results from the CANDELS Survey
• The Major and Minor Galaxy Merger Rates at z < 1.5
• Size evolution of the most massive galaxies at 1.7<z<3 from GOODS NICMOS survey imaging
• A Public Ks-selected Catalog in the COSMOS/UltraVISTA Field: Photometry, Photometric Redshifts and Stellar Population Parameters
• GAMA: towards a physical understanding of galaxy formation
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): The galaxy stellar mass function at z < 0.06
• A Critical Assessment of Photometric Redshift Methods: A CANDELS Investigation
• The VISTA Deep Extragalactic Observations (VIDEO) Survey
• Hubble Space Telescope imaging of the CFRS and LDSS redshift surveys - IV. Influence of mergers in the evolution of faint field galaxies from z~1
• The Subaru/XMM-Newton Deep Survey (SXDS) - II. Optical Imaging and Photometric Catalogs
• Dry Mergers in GEMS: The Dynamical Evolution of Massive Early-Type Galaxies
• Cosmic Variance in the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey
• Star formation rates and masses of z ~ 2 galaxies from multicolour photometry
• A Cosmic Variance Cookbook
• The mass evolution of the first galaxies: stellar mass functions and star formation rates at $4<z<7$ in the CANDELS GOODS-South field
• The Greater Impact of Mergers on the Growth of Massive Galaxies: Implications for Mass Assembly and Evolution Since z~1
• The Deep2 Galaxy Redshift Survey: Evolution of Close Galaxy Pairs and Major-Merger Rates Up to z ~ 1.2
• The VIMOS Public Extragalactic Survey (VIPERS): First Data Release of 57 204 spectroscopic measurements
• New Techniques for Relating Dynamically Close Galaxy Pairs to Merger and Accretion Rates : Application to the SSRS2 Redshift Survey
• Dynamically Close Galaxy Pairs and Merger Rate Evolution in the CNOC2 Redshift Survey
• The Redshift Evolution of Wet, Dry, and Mixed Galaxy Mergers from Close Galaxy Pairs in the DEEP2 Galaxy Redshift Survey
• History of Galaxy Interactions and their Impact on Star Formation over the Last 7 Gyr from GEMS
• The Structures of Distant Galaxies I: Galaxy Structures and the Merger Rate to z~3 in the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field
• A calibration of the relation between the abundance of close galaxy pairs and the rate of galaxy mergers
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): Spectroscopic analysis
• The sizes, masses and specific star-formation rates of massive galaxies at 1.3<z<1.5: strong evidence in favour of evolution via minor mergers
• Early and Rapid Merging as a Formation Mechanism of Massive Galaxies: Empirical Constraints
• The VIMOS VLT Deep Survey :Evolution of the major merger rate since z~1 from spectroscopicaly confirmed galaxy pairs
• The structures and total (minor + major) merger histories of massive galaxies up to z = 3 in the HST GOODS NICMOS Survey: A possible solution to the size evolution problem
• Quantifying cosmic variance
• Shape asymmetry: a morphological indicator for automatic detection of galaxies in the post-coalescence merger stages
• The Rising Star-Formation Histories of Distant Galaxies and Implications for Gas Accretion with Time
• The Redshift and Mass Dependence on the Formation of The Hubble Sequence at z>1 from CANDELS/UDS
• Deep near-infrared spectroscopy of passively evolving galaxies at z>1.4
• High velocity outflows from young star-forming galaxies in the UKIDSS Ultra-Deep Survey
• The dominant role of mergers in the size evolution of massive early-type galaxies since z ~ 1
• The Millennium Galaxy Catalogue: The connection between close pairs and asymmetry; implications for the galaxy merger rate
• Galaxy Merger Statistics and Inferred Bulge-to-Disk Ratios in Cosmological SPH Simulations
• The Luminosity Dependence of the Galaxy Merger Rate
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): autoz spectral redshift measurements, confidence and errors
• Close Pairs of Field Galaxies in the CNOC1 Redshift Survey
• Using Cumulative Number Densities to Compare Galaxies across Cosmic Time
• The evolving slope of the stellar mass function at 0.6 <= z < 4.5 from deep WFC3 data
• Galaxy and Mass Assembly (GAMA): Optimal Tiling of Dense Surveys with a Multi-Object Spectrograph
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): Stellar mass functions by Hubble type
• Resolving the Discrepancy of Galaxy Merger Fraction Measurements at z ~ 0 - 3
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): The input catalogue and star-galaxy separation
• The Properties and Evolution of a K-band Selected Sample of Massive Galaxies at z~0.4 - 2 in the Palomar/DEEP2 Survey
• A remarkably high fraction of strong Ly_alpha emitters amongst luminous redshift 6.0<z<6.5 Lyman break galaxies in the UKIDSS Ultra-Deep Survey
• Galaxy Pairs in COSMOS -- Merger Rate Evolution Since z=1
• The Role of Galaxy Interactions and Mergers in Star Formation at z<1.3: Mid-Infrared Properties in the Spitzer First Look Survey
• The ALHAMBRA Survey: Bayesian Photometric Redshifts with 23 bands for 3 squared degrees
• Deconstructing the Galaxy Stellar Mass Function with UKIDSS and CANDELS: the Impact of Colour, Structure and Environment
• A Survey of Faint Galaxy Pairs
• Spitzer bright, UltraVISTA faint sources in COSMOS: the contribution to the overall population of massive galaxies at z=3-7
• Studying the emergence of the red sequence through galaxy clustering: host halo masses at z > 2
• The Pair Fraction of Massive Galaxies at 0 < z < 3
• Massive Close Pairs Measure Rapid Galaxy Assembly in Mergers at High Redshift
• The diminishing importance of major galaxy mergers at higher redshifts
• An analysis of the evolving comoving number density of galaxies in hydrodynamical simulations
• A Surprisingly High Pair Fraction for Extremely Massive Galaxies at z ~ 3 in the GOODS NICMOS Survey
• Tracing Galaxies Through Cosmic Time with Number Density Selection
• The Galaxy Major Merger Fraction to z ~ 1
• The VIMOS VLT Deep Survey: the contribution of minor mergers to the growth of L_B >= L*_B galaxies since z ~ 1 from spectroscopically identified pairs
• Gas Accretion as a Dominant Formation Mode in Massive Galaxies from the GOODS NICMOS Survey
• Halo and Galaxy Formation Histories from the Millennium Simulation: Public release of a VO-oriented and SQL-queryable database for studying the evolution of galaxies in the LambdaCDM cosmogony
• Minor vs Major Mergers: The Stellar Mass Growth of Massive Galaxies from z=3 using Number Density Selection Techniques
• A blind test of photometric redshifts on ground-based data
• MASSIV: Mass Assembly Survey with SINFONI in VVDS. V. The major merger rate of star-forming galaxies at 0.9 < z < 1.8 from IFS-based close pairs
• A Comparison of Galaxy Merger History Observations and Predictions from Semi-Analytic Models
• Galaxy Formation as a Cosmological Tool. I: The Galaxy Merger History as a Measure of Cosmological Parameters
• The Structures of Distant Galaxies - IV: A New Empirical Measurement of the Time-Scale for Galaxy Mergers - Implications for the Merger History
• The ALHAMBRA survey: Accurate merger fractions by PDF analysis of photometric close pairs
• Tracing galaxy populations through cosmic time: A critical test of methods for connecting the same galaxies between different redshifts at $z<3$
• The Evolution of Galaxies at Constant Number Density: A Less Biased View of Star Formation, Quenching, and Structural Formation
• Satellite galaxies around present-day massive ellipticals
• nIFTy galaxy cluster simulations V: Investigation of the Cluster Infall Region
• Connecting the Dots: Tracking Galaxy Evolution Using Constant Cumulative Number Density at 3<z<7

Cited by in corpus (90)

• The NANOGrav 15-year Data Set: Constraints on Supermassive Black Hole Binaries from the Gravitational Wave Background
• Observational constraints on the merger history of galaxies since $z\approx 6$: Probabilistic galaxy pair counts in the CANDELS fields
• Effect of galaxy mergers on star formation rates
• Constraining astrophysical observables of Galaxy and Supermassive Black Hole Binary Mergers using Pulsar Timing Arrays
• Galaxy Merger Rates up to z $\sim$ 3 using a Bayesian Deep Learning Model $-$ A Major-Merger classifier using IllustrisTNG Simulation data
• Major Merging History in CANDELS. I. Evolution of the Incidence of Massive Galaxy-Galaxy Pairs from z=3 to z~0
• The Host-Galaxy Properties of Type 1 Versus Type 2 Active Galactic Nuclei
• What shapes a galaxy? - Unraveling the role of mass, environment and star formation in forming galactic structure
• The prevalence of pseudo-bulges in the Auriga simulations
• The ALPINE-ALMA [CII] survey: The contribution of major mergers to the galaxy mass assembly at z~5
• EMERGE: Empirical predictions of galaxy merger rates since $z\sim 6$
• New criteria for the selection of galaxy close pairs from cosmological simulations: evolution of the major and minor merger fraction in MUSE deep fields
• The Frequency of Dwarf Galaxy Multiples at Low Redshift in SDSS vs. Cosmological Expectations
• A direct measurement of galaxy major and minor merger rates and stellar mass accretion histories at $z<3$ using galaxy pairs in the REFINE survey
• Galaxy Evolution in all Five CANDELS Fields and IllustrisTNG: Morphological, Structural, and the Major Merger Evolution to $z\sim 3$
• Galaxy Mergers in the Epoch of Reionization I: A JWST Study of Pair Fractions, Merger Rates, and Stellar Mass Accretion Rates at $z=4.5-11.5$
• The MAGPI Survey -- science goals, design, observing strategy, early results and theoretical framework
• X-shooter Spectroscopy and HST Imaging of 15 Ultra Massive Quiescent Galaxies at $z\gtrsim 2$
• Does black-hole growth depend on the cosmic environment?
• An alternate approach to measure specific star formation rates at 2<z<7
• The NANOGrav 12.5-year Data Set: Bayesian Limits on Gravitational Waves from Individual Supermassive Black Hole Binaries
• Galaxy interactions in IllustrisTNG-100, I: The power and limitations of visual identification
• Quiescent Galaxy Size and Spectroscopic Evolution: Combining HSC Imaging and Hectospec Spectroscopy
• A Statistical Semi-Empirical Model: Satellite galaxies in Groups and Clusters
• Statistics of galaxy mergers: bridging the gap between theory and observation
• Galaxy mergers up to z<2.5 I : The star formation properties of merging galaxies at separations 3-15 kpc
• The miniJPAS survey: the photometric redshift catalogue
• A significant excess in major merger rate for AGNs with the highest Eddington ratios at z<0.2
• Enhanced HI profile asymmetries in close galaxy pairs
• North Ecliptic Pole merging galaxy catalogue
• Extremely massive disc galaxies in the nearby Universe form through gas-rich minor mergers
• No tension between assembly models of supermassive black hole binaries and pulsar observations
• Euclid: Early Release Observations -- Deep anatomy of nearby galaxies
• GW190521 from the Merger of Ultra-Dwarf Galaxies
• Identifying Galaxy Mergers in Simulated CEERS NIRCam Images using Random Forests
• Towards a consistent framework of comparing galaxy mergers in observations and simulations
• Clustering with JWST: Constraining Galaxy Host Halo Masses, Satellite Quenching Efficiencies, and Merger Rates at z=4-10
• Observations contradict galaxy size and surface brightness predictions that are based on the expanding universe hypothesis
• The Stripe 82 Massive Galaxy Project III: A Lack of Growth Among Massive Galaxies
• A declining major merger fraction with redshift in the local Universe from the largest-yet catalog of major and minor mergers in SDSS
• DETECTIFz galaxy groups in the REFINE survey -- 1. Group detection and quenched fraction evolution at $z<2.5$
• The role of mass and environment in the build up of the quenched galaxy population since cosmic noon
• A Census of WISE-selected Dual and Offset AGN Across the Sky: New Constraints on Merger-Driven Triggering of Obscured AGN
• The (black hole mass)-(color) relations for early- and late-type galaxies: red and blue sequences
• OH Megamasers in HI Surveys: Forecasts and a Machine Learning Approach to Separating Disks from Mergers
• Living with Neighbors. II. Statistical Analysis of Flybys and Mergers of Dark Matter Halos in Cosmological Simulations
• Galaxy and Mass Assembly: luminosity and stellar mass functions in GAMA groups
• Studying the Physical Properties of Tidal Features I. Extracting Morphological Substructure in CANDELS Observations and VELA Simulations
• A Triple AGN in the NGC 7733-7734 Merging Group
• Galaxy Morphologies Revealed with Subaru HSC and Super-Resolution Techniques I: Major Merger Fractions of L_UV~3-15 L_UV* Dropout Galaxies at z~4-7
• The Connection between Mergers and AGN Activity in Simulated and Observed Massive Galaxies
• The nuclear activity and central structure of the elliptical galaxy NGC 5322
• Lecture notes on black hole binary astrophysics
• The evolution of compact massive quiescent and starforming galaxies derived from the $R_e-R_h$ and $M_{\mathrm{star}}-M_h$ relations
• Massive Early-Type Galaxies in the HSC-SSP: Flux Fraction of Tidal Features and Merger Rates
• Galaxy merger challenge: A comparison study between machine learning-based detection methods
• Gravitational orbits in the expanding universe revisited
• Systematically Asymmetric: A comparison of \hi\ profile asymmetries in real and simulated galaxies
• Massive Galaxy Mergers Have Distinctive Global HI Profiles
• Characterising the Structure of Halo Merger Trees Using a Single Parameter: The Tree Entropy
• Star-formation rates of cluster galaxies: nature vs nurture
• The Mass Growth and Stellar Ages of Galaxies: Observations versus Simulations
• Obscured AGN enhancement in galaxy pairs at cosmic noon: evidence from a probabilistic treatment of photometric redshifts
• A Comparison of Star-Forming Clumps and Tidal Tails in Local Mergers and High Redshift Galaxies
• Probing the Delay Time of Supermassive Black Hole Binary Mergers With Gravitational Waves
• Evolution of the galaxy merger fraction in the CLAUDS+HSC-SSP deep fields
• Emission Line Galaxies in the SHARDS Frontier Fields I: Candidate Selection and the Discovery of Bursty Hα Emitters
• Galaxy Mergers in the Epoch of Reionization II: Major Merger-Triggered Star Formation and AGN Activities at $z=$ 4.5-8.5
• Merger identification through photometric bands, colours, and their errors
• Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) Survey: The Merging Potential of Brightest Group Galaxies
• EMERGE: Constraining merging probabilities and timescales of close galaxy pairs
• The significant effects of stellar mass estimation on galaxy pair fractions
• Halo Growth and Merger Rates as a Cosmological Test
• Evolution of 3-dimensional Shape of Passively Evolving and Star-forming Galaxies at $z<1$
• Investigating the Growth of Little Red Dot Descendants at z<4 with the JWST
• Galaxy pairs in The Three Hundred simulations: a study on the performance of observational pair-finding techniques
• Age-Divided Mean Stellar Populations from Full Spectrum Fitting as the Simplified Star Formation and Chemical Evolution History of a Galaxy: Methodology and Reliability
• Evolution of massive quiescent galaxies via envelope accretion
• Galaxy pairs in The Three Hundred simulations II: studying bound ones and identifying them via machine learning
• Impact of Galactic Interactions on the Evolution of the Far-Infrared-Radio Correlation
• The JWST Emission Line Survey (JELS): The sizes and merger fraction of star-forming galaxies during the Epoch of Reionization
• The spatially-resolved effect of mergers on the stellar mass assembly of MaNGA galaxies
• Time-average properties of $z\sim 0.6$ major mergers: mergers significantly scatter high-z scaling relations
• Euclid preparation: TBD. Cosmic Dawn Survey: evolution of the galaxy stellar mass function across 0.2<z<6.5 measured over 10 square degrees
• Heterogeneity of Inverted Calcium II H:K Ratio Cluster Galaxies
• The most massive galaxies with large depleted cores: structural parameter relations and black hole masses
• A Simulation Driven Deep Learning Approach for Separating Mergers and Star Forming Galaxies: The Formation Histories of Clumpy Galaxies in all the CANDELS Fields
• Testing the key role of the stellar mass-halo mass relation in galaxy merger rates and morphologies via DECODE, a novel Discrete statistical sEmi-empiriCal mODEl
• Spatially non-parametric recovery of intrinsic kinematic maps in pre- to post-merger galaxies
• Ergodicity of FIRE: star formation variations within and between simulated galaxies