VERTICO IV: Environmental Effects on the Gas Distribution and Star Formation Efficiency of Virgo Cluster Spirals

Abstract

We measure the molecular-to-atomic gas ratio, $R_{\mathrm{mol}}$, and the star formation rate (SFR) per unit molecular gas mass, SFE${}_{\mathrm{mol}}$, in 38 nearby galaxies selected from the Virgo Environment Traced in CO (VERTICO) survey. We determine their scale-lengths for the molecular and stellar components and find a roughly 3:5 ratio between them compared to $\sim$1:1 in field galaxies, indicating that the CO emission is more centrally concentrated than the stars. We compute $R_{\mathrm{mol}}$ as a function of different physical quantities. While the spatially-resolved $R_{\mathrm{mol}}$ on average decreases with increasing radius, we find that the mean molecular-to-atomic gas ratio within the stellar effective radius $R_{\mathrm{e}}$, $R_{\mathrm{mol}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$, shows a systematic increase with the level of H${}_{\mathrm{I}}$, truncation and/or asymmetry (H${}_{\mathrm{I}}$ perturbation). Analysis of the molecular- and the atomic-to-stellar mass ratios within $R_{\mathrm{e}}$, $R_{\star }^{\mathrm{mol}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$ and $R_{\star }^{\mathrm{atom}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$, shows that VERTICO galaxies have increasingly lower $R_{\star }^{\mathrm{atom}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$ for larger levels of H${}_{\mathrm{I}}$perturbation (compared to field galaxies matched in stellar mass), but no significant change in $R_{\star }^{\mathrm{mol}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$. We also measure a clear systematic decrease of the SFE${}_{\mathrm{mol}}$ within $R_{\mathrm{e}}$, SFE${}_{\mathrm{mol}}(r<R_{\mathrm{e}})$, with increasingly perturbed H${}_{\mathrm{I}}$. Therefore, compared to galaxies from the field, VERTICO galaxies are more compact in CO emission in relation to their stellar distribution, but increasingly perturbed atomic gas increases their $R_{\mathrm{mol}}$ and decreases the efficiency with which their molecular gas forms stars. (abridged)

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• The ALMaQUEST Survey XVII: Unveiling Multiple Quenching Pathways in Green Valley Galaxies via Molecular Gas and Quenching Timescale Analyses
• Atomic Hydrogen Shows its True Colours: Correlations between HI and Galaxy Colour in Simulations
• Sub-kpc scale gas density histogram of the Galactic molecular gas: a new statistical method to characterise galactic-scale gas structures
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• Contour Analysis Tool: an interactive tool for background and morphology analysis
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