The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high-
Massive quiescent galaxies have much smaller physical sizes at high redshift than today. The strong evolution of galaxy size may be caused by progenitor bias, major and minor mergers, adiabatic expansion, and/or renewed star formation, but it is difficult to test these theories observationally. Here...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
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Oxford University Press
2017
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108527 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5653-0786 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8593-7692 |
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| author | Wellons, Sarah Ma, Chung-Pei Rodriguez-Gomez, Vicente Pillepich, Annalisa Nelson, Dylan Genel, Shy Hernquist, Lars Torrey, Paul A. Vogelsberger, Mark |
| author2 | MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research |
| author_facet | MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research Wellons, Sarah Ma, Chung-Pei Rodriguez-Gomez, Vicente Pillepich, Annalisa Nelson, Dylan Genel, Shy Hernquist, Lars Torrey, Paul A. Vogelsberger, Mark |
| author_sort | Wellons, Sarah |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Massive quiescent galaxies have much smaller physical sizes at high redshift than today. The strong evolution of galaxy size may be caused by progenitor bias, major and minor mergers, adiabatic expansion, and/or renewed star formation, but it is difficult to test these theories observationally. Herein, we select a sample of 35 massive, compact galaxies (M* = 1–3 × 10[superscript 11] M⊙, M*/R[superscript 1.5] > 10[superscript 10.5] M⊙/kpc[superscript 1.5) at z = 2 in the cosmological hydrodynamical simulation Illustris and trace them forwards to z = 0 to uncover their evolution and identify their descendants. By z = 0, the original factor of 3 difference in stellar mass spreads to a factor of 20. The dark matter halo masses similarly spread from a factor of 5 to 40. The galaxies’ evolutionary paths are diverse: about half acquire an ex situ envelope and are the core of a more massive descendant, a third survive undisturbed and gain very little mass, 15 per cent are consumed in a merger with a more massive galaxy, and a small remainder are thoroughly mixed by major mergers. The galaxies grow in size as well as mass, and only ∼10 per cent remain compact by z = 0. The majority of the size growth is driven by the acquisition of ex situ mass. The most massive galaxies at z = 0 are the most likely to have compact progenitors, but this trend possesses significant dispersion which precludes a direct linkage to compact galaxies at z = 2. The compact galaxies’ merger rates are influenced by their z = 2 environments, so that isolated or satellite compact galaxies (which are protected from mergers) are the most likely to survive to the present day. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:13:09Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/108527 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | en_US |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:13:09Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | Oxford University Press |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1085272024-07-15T17:26:01Z The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- Wellons, Sarah Ma, Chung-Pei Rodriguez-Gomez, Vicente Pillepich, Annalisa Nelson, Dylan Genel, Shy Hernquist, Lars Torrey, Paul A. Vogelsberger, Mark MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics Torrey, Paul A. Vogelsberger, Mark Massive quiescent galaxies have much smaller physical sizes at high redshift than today. The strong evolution of galaxy size may be caused by progenitor bias, major and minor mergers, adiabatic expansion, and/or renewed star formation, but it is difficult to test these theories observationally. Herein, we select a sample of 35 massive, compact galaxies (M* = 1–3 × 10[superscript 11] M⊙, M*/R[superscript 1.5] > 10[superscript 10.5] M⊙/kpc[superscript 1.5) at z = 2 in the cosmological hydrodynamical simulation Illustris and trace them forwards to z = 0 to uncover their evolution and identify their descendants. By z = 0, the original factor of 3 difference in stellar mass spreads to a factor of 20. The dark matter halo masses similarly spread from a factor of 5 to 40. The galaxies’ evolutionary paths are diverse: about half acquire an ex situ envelope and are the core of a more massive descendant, a third survive undisturbed and gain very little mass, 15 per cent are consumed in a merger with a more massive galaxy, and a small remainder are thoroughly mixed by major mergers. The galaxies grow in size as well as mass, and only ∼10 per cent remain compact by z = 0. The majority of the size growth is driven by the acquisition of ex situ mass. The most massive galaxies at z = 0 are the most likely to have compact progenitors, but this trend possesses significant dispersion which precludes a direct linkage to compact galaxies at z = 2. The compact galaxies’ merger rates are influenced by their z = 2 environments, so that isolated or satellite compact galaxies (which are protected from mergers) are the most likely to survive to the present day. 2017-05-01T13:49:12Z 2017-05-01T13:49:12Z 2015-12 2015-11 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0035-8711 1365-2966 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108527 Wellons, Sarah; Torrey, Paul; Ma, Chung-Pei; Rodriguez-Gomez, Vicente; Pillepich, Annalisa; Nelson, Dylan; Genel, Shy; Vogelsberger, Mark; and Hernquist, Lars. “The Diverse Evolutionary Paths of Simulated High-Zmassive, Compact Galaxies Toz= 0.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 456, no. 1 (December 2015): 1030–1048. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5653-0786 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8593-7692 en_US http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stv2738 Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf Oxford University Press arXiv |
| spellingShingle | Wellons, Sarah Ma, Chung-Pei Rodriguez-Gomez, Vicente Pillepich, Annalisa Nelson, Dylan Genel, Shy Hernquist, Lars Torrey, Paul A. Vogelsberger, Mark The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title | The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title_full | The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title_fullStr | The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title_full_unstemmed | The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title_short | The diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high- |
| title_sort | diverse evolutionary paths of simulated high |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108527 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5653-0786 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8593-7692 |
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