The Elephant in the Bathtub: when the physics of star formation regulate the baryon cycle of galaxies

Abstract

In simple models of galaxy formation and evolution, star formation is solely regulated by the amount of gas present in the galaxy. However, it has recently been shown that star formation can be suppressed by galactic dynamics in galaxies that contain a dominant spheroidal component and a low gas fraction. This 'dynamical suppression' is hypothesised to also contribute to quenching gas-rich galaxies at high redshift, but its impact on the galaxy population at large remains unclear. In this paper, we assess the importance of dynamical suppression in the context of gas regulator models of galaxy evolution through hydrodynamic simulations of isolated galaxies, with gas-to-stellar mass ratios of 0.01-0.20 and a range of galactic gravitational potentials from disc-dominated to spheroidal. Star formation is modelled using a dynamics-dependent efficiency per free-fall time, which depends on the virial parameter of the gas. We find that dynamical suppression becomes more effective at lower gas fractions and quantify its impact on the star formation rate as a function of gas fraction and stellar spheroid mass surface density. We combine the results of our simulations with observed scaling relations that describe the change of galaxy properties across cosmic time, and determine the galaxy mass and redshift range where dynamical suppression may affect the baryon cycle. We predict that the physics of star formation can limit and regulate the baryon cycle at low redshifts ($z\lesssim 1.4$) and high galaxy masses ($M_{\ast }\gtrsim 3\times 10^{10}{M}_{\odot }$), where dynamical suppression can drive galaxies off the star formation main sequence.

arXiv comment12 pages, 6 figures, accepted by MNRAS (Nov. 03, 2020)

References in corpus (83)

• Galactic Stellar and Substellar Initial Mass Function
• The Global Schmidt Law in Star Forming Galaxies
• The many lives of active galactic nuclei: cooling flows, black holes and the luminosities and colours of galaxies
• The Origin of the Mass--Metallicity Relation: Insights from 53,000 Star-Forming Galaxies in the SDSS
• Observational Evidence of AGN Feedback
• The broken hierarchy of galaxy formation
• E pur si muove: Galiliean-invariant cosmological hydrodynamical simulations on a moving mesh
• Modeling feedback from stars and black holes in galaxy mergers
• Mass and environment as drivers of galaxy evolution in SDSS and zCOSMOS and the origin of the Schechter function
• 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
• Galaxy Bimodality due to Cold Flows and Shock Heating
• Galaxy Harassment and the Evolution of Clusters of Galaxies
• A Highly Consistent Framework for the Evolution of the Star-Forming "Main Sequence" from z~0-6
• Galaxies on FIRE (Feedback In Realistic Environments): Stellar Feedback Explains Cosmologically Inefficient Star Formation
• UniverseMachine: The Correlation between Galaxy Growth and Dark Matter Halo Assembly from z=0-10
• Radiative transfer in a clumpy universe: IV. New synthesis models of the cosmic UV/X-ray background
• A fundamental relation between mass, SFR and metallicity in local and high redshift galaxies
• PHIBSS: molecular gas content and scaling relations in z~1-3 normal star forming galaxies
• Gas-regulation of galaxies: the evolution of the cosmic sSFR, the metallicity-mass-SFR relation and the stellar content of haloes
• Morphological quenching of star formation: making early-type galaxies red
• Galaxy Structure and Mode of Star Formation in the SFR-Mass Plane from z ~ 2.5 to z ~ 0.1
• Molecular Gas and Star Formation in Nearby Disk Galaxies
• PHIBSS: Unified Scaling Relations of Gas Depletion Time and Molecular Gas Fractions
• The Mass Assembly History of Field Galaxies: Detection of an Evolving Mass Limit for Star Forming Galaxies
• The Impact of cold gas accretion above a mass floor on galaxy scaling relations
• xCOLD GASS: the complete IRAM-30m legacy survey of molecular gas for galaxy evolution studies
• The Origin of the Galaxy Mass-Metallicity Relation and Implications for Galactic Outflows
• Towards a complete accounting of energy and momentum from stellar feedback in galaxy formation simulations
• Self-Regulated Star Formation in Galaxies via Momentum Input from Massive Stars
• EMERGE - An empirical model for the formation of galaxies since $z\sim 10$
• The Effects of Stellar Rotation. II. A Comprehensive Set of Starburst99 Models
• xGASS: Total cold gas scaling relations and molecular-to-atomic gas ratios of galaxies in the local Universe
• Escape fraction of ionizing photons during reionization: effects due to supernova feedback and runaway OB stars
• Variations in the Galactic star formation rate and density thresholds for star formation
• Grackle: a Chemistry and Cooling Library for Astrophysics
• An energy-conserving formalism for adaptive gravitational force softening in SPH and N-body codes
• Bulge Growth and Quenching since z = 2.5 in CANDELS/3D-HST
• A Unified Model for Galactic Discs: Star Formation, Turbulence Driving, and Mass Transport
• Toy Models for Galaxy Formation versus Simulations
• The star-formation activity of IllustrisTNG galaxies: main sequence, UVJ diagram, quenched fractions, and systematics
• What controls star formation in the central 500 pc of the Galaxy?
• The lifecycle of molecular clouds in nearby star-forming disc galaxies
• A universal structural and star-forming relation since $z\sim 3$: connecting compact star-forming and quiescent galaxies
• Fast and inefficient star formation due to short-lived molecular clouds and rapid feedback
• Fluctuating feedback-regulated escape fraction of ionizing radiation in low-mass, high-redshift galaxies
• On the evolution of the molecular gas fraction of star forming galaxies
• The Rise and Fall of Passive Disk Galaxies: Morphological Evolution Along the Red Sequence Revealed by COSMOS
• The SINS/zC-SINF survey of z~2 galaxy kinematics: evidence for gravitational quenching
• The ATLAS3D Project - XXVIII. Dynamically-driven star formation suppression in early-type galaxies
• Geometry of Star-Forming Galaxies from SDSS, 3D-HST and CANDELS
• A Simple Law of Star Formation
• Early type galaxies have been the predominant morphological class for massive galaxies since only z~1
• An analytic solution for the minimal bathtub toy model: challenges in the star-formation history of high-z galaxies
• The AGORA High-Resolution Galaxy Simulations Comparison Project. II: Isolated Disk Test
• From haloes to Galaxies - I. The dynamics of the gas regulator model and the implied cosmic sSFR history
• Stochastic modelling of star-formation histories II: star-formation variability from molecular clouds and gas inflow
• Non-universal star formation efficiency in turbulent ISM
• The ATLAS3D project - XXII. Low-efficiency star formation in early-type galaxies: hydrodynamic models and observations
• Heart of Darkness: the influence of galactic dynamics on quenching star formation in galaxy spheroids
• An uncertainty principle for star formation - II. A new method for characterising the cloud-scale physics of star formation and feedback across cosmic history
• Galaxies hosting an AGN: a view from the CALIFA survey
• The morphologies of massive galaxies from z~3 - Witnessing the 2 channels of bulge growth
• Supernova Driving. IV. The Star Formation Rate of Molecular Clouds
• How Galactic Environment affects the Dynamical State of Molecular Clouds and their Star Formation Efficiency
• Massive quenched galaxies at z~0.7 retain large molecular gas reservoirs
• From 'bathtub' galaxy evolution models to metallicity gradients
• What shapes a galaxy? - Unraveling the role of mass, environment and star formation in forming galactic structure
• The failure of stellar feedback, magnetic fields, conduction, and morphological quenching in maintaining red galaxies
• The MASSIVE survey - XI. What drives the molecular gas properties of early-type galaxies
• Nearly all Massive Quiescent Disk Galaxies have a Surprisingly Large Atomic Gas Reservoir
• Cosmic Rays or Turbulence can Suppress Cooling Flows (Where Thermal Heating or Momentum Injection Fail)
• A panchromatic spatially resolved analysis of nearby galaxies -- II. The main sequence - gas relation at sub-kpc scale in grand-design spirals
• Forming early-type galaxies without AGN feedback: a combination of merger-driven outflows and inefficient star formation
• MUFASA: The assembly of the red sequence
• Towards a deeper understanding of the physics driving galaxy quenching -- inferring trends in the gas content via extinction
• Star Formation Quenching Timescale of Central Galaxies in a Hierarchical Universe
• Stellar mass functions of galaxies, disks and spheroids at z~0.1
• What Drives Galaxy Quenching? Resolving Molecular Gas and Star Formation in the Green Valley
• xGASS: The Role of Bulges Along and Across the Local Star-Forming Main Sequence
• Dust properties in the cold and hot gas phases of the ATLAS3D early-type galaxies as revealed by AKARI
• Galaxy Structure, Stellar Populations, and Star Formation Quenching at 0.6 $\lesssim$ $z$ $\lesssim$ 1.2
• Pre-supernova feedback mechanisms drive the destruction of molecular clouds in nearby star-forming disc galaxies

Cited by in corpus (11)

• Stellar structures, molecular gas, and star formation across the PHANGS sample of nearby galaxies
• WISDOM Project -- X. The morphology of the molecular ISM in galaxy centres and its dependence on galaxy structure
• Interacting galaxies in the IllustrisTNG simulations -- III: (the rarity of) quenching in post-merger galaxies
• Variations in the ${\Sigma }_{\mathrm{SFR}}-{\Sigma }_{\mathrm{mol}}-{\Sigma }_{\star }$ plane across galactic environments in PHANGS galaxies
• Resolved Molecular Gas Observations of MaNGA Post-starbursts Reveal a Tumultuous Past
• WISDOM project -- XI. Star Formation Efficiency in the Bulge of the AGN-host Galaxy NGC 3169 with SITELLE and ALMA
• Investigating the link between inner gravitational potential and star-formation quenching in CALIFA galaxies
• Reconciling extragalactic star formation efficiencies with theory: insights from PHANGS
• The EDGE-CALIFA survey: Star formation relationships for galaxies at different stages of their evolution
• MaNGA DynPop. VII. A Unified Bulge-Disk-Halo Model for Explaining Diversity in Circular Velocity Curves of 6000 Spiral and Early-Type Galaxies
• Characterizing CO Emitters in the SSA22-AzTEC26 Field