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What stellar populations can tell us about the evolution of the mass–metallicity relation in SDSS galaxies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2010

N. Vale Asari ,
G. Stasińska ,
R. Cid Fernandes ,
J. M. Gomes ,
M. Schlickmann ,
A. Mateus  and
W. Schoenell
N. Vale Asari
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Física - CFM - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil LUTH, Observatoire de Paris, CNRS, Université Paris Diderot; Place Jules Janssen 92190 Meudon, France
G. Stasińska
Affiliation:
LUTH, Observatoire de Paris, CNRS, Université Paris Diderot; Place Jules Janssen 92190 Meudon, France
R. Cid Fernandes
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Física - CFM - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil
J. M. Gomes
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Física - CFM - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil GEPI, Observatoire de Paris, CNRS, Université Paris Diderot; Place Jules Janssen 92190 Meudon, France
M. Schlickmann
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Física - CFM - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil
A. Mateus
Affiliation:
IAG, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
W. Schoenell
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Física - CFM - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil
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Abstract

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During the last three decades, many papers have reported the existence of a luminosity metallicity or mass metallicity (M–Z) relation for all kinds of galaxies: The more massive galaxies are also the ones with more metal-rich interstellar medium. We have obtained the mass-metallicity relation at different lookback times for the same set of galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), using the stellar metallicities estimated with our spectral synthesis code starlight. Using stellar metallicities has several advantages: We are free of the biases that affect the calibration of nebular metallicities; we can include in our study objects for which the nebular metallicity cannot be measured, such as AGN hosts and passive galaxies; we can probe metallicities at different epochs of a galaxy evolution.

We have found that the M–Z relation steepens and spans a wider range in both mass and metallicity at higher redshifts for SDSS galaxies. We also have modeled the time evolution of stellar metallicity with a closed-box chemical evolution model, for galaxies of different types and masses. Our results suggest that the M–Z relation for galaxies with present-day stellar masses down to 1010M⊙ is mainly driven by the star formation history and not by inflows or outflows.

Keywords

galaxies: evolutiongalaxies: statisticsgalaxies: stellar content
Type
Poster Papers
Information
Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union , Volume 5 , Symposium S262: Stellar Populations – Planning for the Next Decade , August 2009 , pp. 442 - 443
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2010

References

Cid Fernandes, R., Mateus, A., Sodré, L., Stasińska, G., & Gomes, J. M. 2005, MNRAS, 358, 363CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vale Asari, N., Stasińska, G., Cid Fernandes, R., Gomes, J. M., Schlickmann, M., Mateus, A., & Schoenell, W. 2009, MNRAS, 396, L71CrossRefGoogle Scholar