The robustness in identifying and quantifying high-redshift bars using JWST observations

Abstract

Understanding the methodological robustness in identifying and quantifying high-redshift bars is essential for studying their evolution with the {\it James} {\it Webb} Space Telescope (JWST). We used nearby spiral galaxies to generate simulated images at various resolutions and signal-to-noise ratios, and obtained the simulated galaxy images observed in the Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) survey from Yu et al. Through a comparison of measurements before and after image degradation, we show that the bar measurements for massive galaxies remain robust against noise. While the measurement of the bar position angle remains unaffected by resolution, the measured bar ellipticity is significantly underestimated in low-resolution images. The size measurement is on average barely affected as long as the intrinsic bar size $a_{\mathrm{bar},\mathrm{true}}>2\times \mathrm{FWHM}$. To address these effects, correction functions are derived. We also find that the effectiveness of detecting bars remains at $\sim$\,100\% when the $a_{\mathrm{bar},\mathrm{true}}/\mathrm{FWHM}$ is above 2, below which the rate drops sharply, quantitatively validating the effectiveness of using $a_{\mathrm{bar},\mathrm{true}}>2\times \mathrm{FWHM}$ as a bar detection threshold. We analyze a set of simulated CEERS images, which take into account observational effects and plausible galaxy (and bar-size) evolution models, and show that a significant (and misleading) reduction in detected bar fraction with increasing redshift would apparently result even if the true bar fraction remained constant. Our results underscore the importance of disentangling the true bar fraction evolution from resolution effects and bar size growth.

17 pages, 15 figures; accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics (A&A)

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