The Metallicity measurement of Early-type Galaxies

Abstract

We use data for 6048 early-type galaxies (ETGs) from Galaxy Zoo 1 that have been cross-matched with the catalog of the MPA-JHU emission-line measurements for the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7. We measure the metallicity of these ETGs by excluding various ionization sources, and study other properties as well. We use the optimal division line of W2-W3 $=$ 2.5 as a diagnostic tool, and for the first time derive metallicity measurements for 2218 ETGs. We find that these ETGs actually are closer to H II regions as defined by Kauffmann et al. in the Baldwin-philips-Terevich diagram, and they display younger stellar populations. We present a full mass-metallicity relation and find that most ETGs have lower metallicities than star-forming galaxies (SFGs) at a given galaxy stellar mass. We use five metallicity calibrators to check our results. We find that these metallicity indicators (R23, O32, and O3S2) give consistent results. We suggest that the remaining two metallicity calibrators, which increase metallicity by N-enrichment, can be used to calibrate metallicities for SFGs, but not to estimate the metallicities of ETGs.

arXiv commentPublished in ApJL, 6 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (46)

• Galactic Stellar and Substellar Initial Mass Function
• The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE): Mission Description and Initial On-orbit Performance
• On the variation of the Initial Mass Function
• The Seventh Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Host Galaxies of AGN
• The Origin of the Mass--Metallicity Relation: Insights from 53,000 Star-Forming Galaxies in the SDSS
• Theoretical Modeling of Starburst Galaxies
• The Host Galaxies and Classification of Active Galactic Nuclei
• [O III]/[N II] as an Abundance Indicator at High Redshift
• Galaxy Zoo : Morphologies derived from visual inspection of galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• NYU-VAGC: a galaxy catalog based on new public surveys
• The MAPPINGS III Library of Fast Radiative Shock Models
• Mid-Infrared Selection of AGN with the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer. I. Characterizing WISE-Selected AGN in COSMOS
• Galaxy Zoo 1 : Data Release of Morphological Classifications for nearly 900,000 galaxies
• The Mass-Metallicity Relation with the Direct Method on Stacked Spectra of SDSS Galaxies
• The Atlas3D project -- XIII. Mass and morphology of HI in early-type galaxies as a function of environment
• SDSS IV MaNGA - Spatially resolved diagnostic diagrams: A proof that many galaxies are LIERs
• Using the Bright Ultra-Hard XMM-Newton Survey to define an IR selection of luminous AGN based on WISE colours
• UV-optical colours as probes of early-type galaxy evolution
• GALEX UV Color-Magnitude Relations and Evidence for Recent Star Formation in Early-type Galaxies
• New fully empirical calibrations of strong-line metallicity indicators in star forming galaxies
• SDSS-IV MaNGA: The Impact of Diffuse Ionized Gas on Emission-line Ratios, Interpretation of Diagnostic Diagrams, and Gas Metallicity Measurements
• Aperture effects on Star Formation Rate, Metallicity and Reddening
• Molecular Gas and Star Formation in the SAURON Early-type Galaxies
• The role of minor mergers in the recent star formation history of early-type galaxies
• Early-type galaxies in different environments: an HI view
• The MOSDEF survey: a stellar mass-SFR-metallicity relation exists at $z\sim 2.3$
• Nearby early-type galaxies with ionized gas.IV. Origin and powering mechanism of the ionized gas
• NGC 404, A Rejuvenated Lenticular Galaxy on a Merger-Induced, Blueward Excursion into the Green Valley
• Temperature-based metallicity measurements at z=0.8: direct calibration of strong-line diagnostics at intermediate redshift
• The origin of the atomic and molecular gas contents of early-type galaxies. I. A new test of galaxy formation physics
• Molecular and atomic gas in dust lane early-type galaxies - I: Low star-formation efficiencies in minor merger remnants
• Metallicity calibrations for diffuse ionised gas and low ionisation emission regions
• The Atlas3D project - XIX. The hot-gas content of early-type galaxies: fast versus slow rotators
• A Recalibration of Strong Line Oxygen Abundance Diagnostics via the Direct Method and Implications for the High Redshift Universe
• The many faces of LINER-like galaxies: a WISE view
• GASS 3505: the prototype of HI-excess, passive galaxies
• Hoag's Object: Evidence for Cold Accretion onto an Elliptical Galaxy
• Local anti-correlation between star-formation rate and gas-phase metallicity in disk galaxies
• Emission line diagnostics to constrain high temperature populations in early-type galaxies
• Why do many early-type galaxies lack emission lines? I. Fossil clues
• Oxygen Metallicity Determinations from Optical Emission Lines in Early-type Galaxies
• Clues on the rejuvenation of the S0 galaxy NGC 404 from the chemical abundance of its outer disk
• A Comparison of Stellar and Gas-Phase Chemical Abundances in Dusty Early-Type Galaxies
• Evolution of oxygen and nitrogen abundances and nitrogen production mechanism in massive star-forming galaxies
• The evolution and dependence of the local mass-metallicity relation

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Gas phase metallicity determinations in nearby AGNs with SDSS-IV MaNGA: evidence of metal poor accretion
• The Subtle Effects of Mergers on Star Formation in Nearby Galaxies
• Host Galaxy Demographics Of Individually Detectable Supermassive Black-hole Binaries with Pulsar Timing Arrays
• Estimating The Metallicity of Star-forming Early-type Galaxies
• Measuring the Metallicity of Early-type Galaxies. I. Composite Region