Wolf-Rayet stars in the Antennae unveiled by MUSE

Abstract

We present the analysis of archival Very Large Telescope (VLT) Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) observations of the interacting galaxies NGC 4038/39 (a.k.a. the Antennae) at a distance of 18.1 Mpc. Up to 38 young star-forming complexes with evident contribution from Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are unveiled. We use publicly available templates of Galactic WR stars in conjunction with available photometric extinction measurements to quantify and classify the WR population in each star-forming region, on the basis of its nearly Solar oxygen abundance. The total estimated number of WR stars in the Antennae is 4053 $\pm$ 84, of which there are 2021 $\pm$ 60 WNL and 2032 $\pm$ 59 WC-types. Our analysis suggests a global WC to WN-type ratio of 1.01 $\pm$ 0.04, which is consistent with the predictions of the single star evolutionary scenario in the most recent BPASS stellar population synthesis models.

arXiv comment20 pages, 16 figures, 5 tables; accepted to MNRAS

References in corpus (45)

• The chemical composition of the Sun
• Measuring Reddening with SDSS Stellar Spectra and Recalibrating SFD
• Embedded Clusters in Molecular Clouds
• A 2.4% Determination of the Local Value of the Hubble Constant
• The Supernova -- Gamma-Ray Burst Connection
• Young massive star clusters
• Physical Properties of Wolf-Rayet Stars
• Binary Population and Spectral Synthesis Version 2.1: construction, observational verification and new results
• The Progenitor Stars of Gamma-Ray Bursts
• PyNeb: a new tool for analyzing emission lines. I. Code description and validation of results
• New Models for Wolf-Rayet and O Star Populations in Young Starbursts
• Galaxies with Wolf-Rayet signatures in the low-redshift Universe - A survey using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Antennae Galaxies (NGC 4038/4039) Revisited: ACS and NICMOS Observations of a Prototypical Merger
• A Multi-Wavelength Study of the Young Star Clusters and Interstellar Medium in the Antennae Galaxies (NGC 4038/9)
• CHAOS I: Direct Chemical Abundances for HII Regions in NGC 628
• Interaction-induced star formation in a complete sample of 10^5 nearby star-forming galaxies
• The Spitzer Spirals, Bridges, and Tails Interacting Galaxy Survey: Interaction-Induced Star Formation in the Mid-Infrared
• X-ray binaries as the origin of nebular HeII emission in low-metallicity star-forming galaxies
• Spatial distribution of Galactic Wolf-Rayet stars and implications for the global population
• A New Distance to The Antennae Galaxies (NGC 4038/39) Based on the Type Ia Supernova 2007sr
• Interacting galaxies in the nearby Universe: only moderate increase of star formation
• Young Star Cluster Complexes in NGC 4038/39: Integral field spectroscopy using VIMOS-VLT
• Spectral Analysis of the Stromlo-APM Survey I. Spectral Properties of Galaxies
• Gemini Spectroscopic Survey of Young Star Clusters in Merging/Interacting Galaxies. III. The Antennae
• Massive star formation in Wolf-Rayet galaxies. III: Analysis of the O and WR populations
• Constraining the Dark Energy Equation of State with HII Galaxies
• Massive stars on the verge of exploding: the properties of oxygen sequence Wolf-Rayet stars
• The extended HeII$\lambda$4686 emission in the extremely metal-poor galaxy SBS0335-052E seen with MUSE
• The Wolf-Rayet Content of M31
• Uncovering multiple Wolf-Rayet star-clusters and the ionized ISM in Mrk178: the closest metal-poor Wolf-Rayet HII galaxy
• A survey of the Wolf-Rayet population of the barred, spiral galaxy NGC 1313
• How extreme are the Wolf-Rayet clusters in NGC3125?
• On the Origin of Diffuse Ionized Gas in the Antennae Galaxy
• STIS Spectroscopy of Young Star Clusters in "The Antennae" Galaxies (NGC 4038/4039)
• Gemini GMOS spectroscopy of HeII nebulae in M33
• Red Supergiants as cosmic abundance probes: the first direct metallicity determination of NGC 4038 in the Antennae
• Wolf-Rayet stars in M81: Detection and Characterization using GTC/OSIRIS spectra and HST/ACS images
• Ionizing stellar population in the disk of NGC 3310 $-$ I. The impact of a minor merger on galaxy evolution
• Exploring Chemical Homogeneity in Dwarf Galaxies: A VLT-MUSE study of JKB 18
• Resolved Star Formation Efficiency in the Antennae Galaxies
• MEGARA-IFU detection of extended HeII4686 nebular emission in the central region of NGC1569 and its ionization budget
• Stellar populations and physical properties of starbursts in the Antennae galaxy from self-consistent modelling of MUSE spectra
• Hot Interstellar Gas and Stellar Energy Feedback in the Antennae Galaxies
• The Wolf-Rayet star population in the dwarf galaxy NGC 625
• Wolf-Rayet stars in M81 using GTC/OSIRIS: 7 new detections, analysis and classification of the full sample

Cited by in corpus (5)

• The Sunburst Arc with JWST: I. Detection of Wolf-Rayet stars injecting nitrogen into a low-metallicity, $z=2.37$ proto-globular cluster leaking ionizing photons
• Line Luminosities of Galactic and Magellanic Cloud Wolf-Rayet stars
• Detection of He++ ion in the star-forming ring of the Cartwheel using MUSE data and ionizing mechanisms
• The detectability of Wolf-Rayet Stars in M33-ike spirals up to 30 Mpc
• Discovery of young, oxygen-rich supernova remnants in PHANGS-MUSE galaxies