A Possible Local Counterpart to the Excess Population of Faint Blue Galaxies

Abstract

OBSERVATIONS of galaxies to very faint magnitudes have revealed a population of blue galaxies at intermediate redshift${}^{1-5}$. These galaxies represent a significant excess over the expectation of standard cosmological models for reasonable amounts of evolution of the locally observed galaxy population. However, the surveys which define the local galaxy population are strongly biased against objects of low surface brightness${}^{6-9}$. Low surface brightness galaxies have properties very similar to those of the excess blue population${}^{10,11}$, and recent work suggests that they are comparable in abundance to the more readily detected normal galaxies${}^{9,12}$. I show that the very deep surveys which reveal the excess population can easily detect low surface brightness galaxies to large redshifts, but that local surveys will miss them because they are not comparably sensitive. This suggests that the excess faint galaxies {\it are\/} low surface brightness galaxies. No alteration of standard cosmology is required, but it is necessary to reconsider the way in which the galaxy distribution function is specified.

accepted for publication in Nature, 9 pages, uuencoded post- script including 3 figures (128K), also available by anonymous ftp from ftp.ast.cam.ac.uk in pub/ssm/fbgs.uu, CAP-31-28376487215678723

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