What Determines the Local Metallicity of Galaxies: Global Stellar Mass, Local Stellar Mass Surface Density, or Star Formation Rate?

Gao, Yongheng; Wang, Enci; Kong, Xu; Lin, Zhoubin; Liu, Guilin; Liu, Haiyang; Liu, Qing; Hu, Ning; Teklu, Berzaf Berhane; Chen, Xinkai; Zhao, Qinyuan

doi:10.3847/1538-4357/aae9f1

Cited by 28 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 95 publications

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“…In support of this hypothesis, observationally we see that in addition to the stellar mass dependence, both gas-phase oxygen abundances and the stellar metallicities of a galaxy are strongly correlated with gravitational potential and local stellar surface mass density proxies (e.g. Scott et al 2017; Barone et al 2018;D'Eugenio et al 2018;Gao et al 2018; Barone et al 2020).…”

supporting

confidence: 53%

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: the drivers of gas and stellar metallicity differences in galaxies

Fraser-McKelvie,

Cortese,

Groves

et al. 2021

Preprint

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The combination of gas-phase oxygen abundances and stellar metallicities can provide us with unique insights into the metal enrichment histories of galaxies. In this work, we compare the stellar and gas-phase metallicities measured within a 1R e aperture for a representative sample of 472 star-forming galaxies extracted from the SAMI Galaxy Survey. We confirm that the stellar and interstellar medium (ISM) metallicities are strongly correlated, with scatter ∼3 times smaller than that found in previous works, and that integrated stellar populations are generally more metalpoor than the ISM, especially in low-mass galaxies. The ratio between the two metallicities strongly correlates with several integrated galaxy properties including stellar mass, specific star formation rate, and a gravitational potential proxy. However, we show that these trends are primarily a consequence of: (a) the different star formation and metal enrichment histories of the galaxies, and (b) the fact that while stellar metallicities trace primarily iron enrichment, gas-phase metallicity indicators are calibrated to the enrichment of oxygen in the ISM. Indeed, once both metallicities are converted to the same 'element base' all of our trends become significantly weaker. Interestingly, the ratio of gas to stellar metallicity is always below the value expected for a simple closed-box model, which requires that outflows and inflows play an important role in the enrichment history across our entire stellar mass range. This work highlights the complex interplay between stellar and gas-phase metallicities and shows how care must be taken in comparing them to constrain models of galaxy formation and evolution.

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supporting

confidence: 53%

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: the drivers of gas and stellar metallicity differences in galaxies

Fraser-McKelvie,

Cortese,

Groves

et al. 2021

Preprint

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“…However, the second way to look at the relations is purely empirical, to investigate whether they are at least interchangeable in terms of their intensive vs. extensive nature (e.g. Barrera-Ballesteros et al 2016;Gao et al 2018;. Indeed, we will show in the next section that the extensive/global relations are in general a natural consequence of the intensive/resolved ones, while the reverse is not true.…”

Section: Global and Resolved Relationsmentioning

confidence: 93%

From Global to Spatially Resolved in Low-Redshift Galaxies

Sanchez¹,

Walcher

López-Cobá³

et al. 2021

RMxAA

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Our understanding of the structure, composition and evolution of galaxies hasstrongly improved in the last decades, mostly due to new results based on large spectro-scopic and imaging surveys. In particular, the nature of ionized gas, its ionization mech-anisms, its relation with the stellar properties and chemical composition, the existence ofscaling relations that describe the cycle between stars and gas, and the corresponding evo-lution patterns have been widely explored and described. More recently, the introduction ofadditional techniques, in particular integral field spectroscopy, and their use in large galaxysurveys, have forced us to re-interpret most of those recent results from a spatially resolvedperspective. This review is aimed to complement recent efforts to compile and summarizethis change of paradigm in the interpretation of galaxy evolution. To this end we replicatepublished results, and present novel ones, based on the largest compilation of IFS data ofgalaxies in the nearby universe to date.

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“…A strong correlation between local stellar surface density and local gas-phase metallicity, an apparent analog to the global MZR, is found based on the spatially-resolved spectroscopic data by many authors (e.g. Moran et al 2012;Rosales-Ortega et al 2012;Barrera-Ballesteros et al 2016;Zhu et al 2017;Gao et al 2018).…”

mentioning

confidence: 87%

Gas-phase Metallicity as a Diagnostic of the Drivers of Star-formation on Different Spatial Scales

Wang,

Lilly

2020

Preprint

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This work mainly includes two parts: the theoretical predictions and observational results on the correlation of SFR and gas-phase metallicity Z gas . We first predict the correlation between SFR, cold gas mass and Z gas in the gas-regulator frame that the instantaneous SFR is regulated by the interplay between inflow, outflow and star formation. The mean SFR is determined by mean inflow rate and mass-loading factor λ, while the mean Z gas is determined by the metallicity of inflow gas Z 0 and the effective yield (y eff ≡ y/(1 + λ)). The SFR and Z gas relative to their mean values, denoted as ∆SFR and ∆Z gas , are found to be negatively (or positively) correlated when driving the gas-regulator with time-varying inflow rate (or SFE). We then study the correlation of ∆sSFR and ∆Z gas (defined in a similar way as in the model) from the observation, at both ∼100 pc scale and galactic scale based on two 2-dimensional spectroscopic surveys with different spatial resolutions, MAD and MaNGA. The metallicity increases strongly with global stellar mass across galaxy population, and decreases with galactic radius within individual galaxies, which can be interpreted as the mass and radial dependence of Z 0 and y eff . After taking out the mass and radial dependence, we find that ∆sSFR and ∆Z gas are found to be, negatively correlated at galactic or sub-galactic scale across galaxy population, and positively correlated at ∼100 pc scale within galaxies. This strongly supports the conclusion that the star formation is primarily driven by the time-varying inflow at galactic scale, and driven by the time-varying SFE at ∼100 pc scale. Furthermore, at sub-galactic scale, the variation of ∆sSFR and ∆Z gas as a function of gas depletion time are well matched with the model predications of time-varying inflow rate, strongly strengthening our conclusion. We build a comprehensive frame to understand the correlation between SFR, cold gas mass and metallicity, as well as the variability of them, which potentially uncovers the relevant physical processes of star formation at different scales.

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What Determines the Local Metallicity of Galaxies: Global Stellar Mass, Local Stellar Mass Surface Density, or Star Formation Rate?

Cited by 28 publications

References 95 publications

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: the drivers of gas and stellar metallicity differences in galaxies

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: the drivers of gas and stellar metallicity differences in galaxies

From Global to Spatially Resolved in Low-Redshift Galaxies

Gas-phase Metallicity as a Diagnostic of the Drivers of Star-formation on Different Spatial Scales

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