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SHARDS: AN OPTICAL SPECTRO-PHOTOMETRIC SURVEY OF DISTANT GALAXIES
- Source :
- The Astrophysical Journal, The Astrophysical Journal, American Astronomical Society, 2013, 762 (1), ⟨10.1088/0004-637X/762/1/46⟩, E-Prints Complutense. Archivo Institucional de la UCM, instname, E-Prints Complutense: Archivo Institucional de la UCM, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, The Astrophysical Journal, 2013, 762 (1), ⟨10.1088/0004-637X/762/1/46⟩, Digital.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
- Publication Year :
- 2013
- Publisher :
- HAL CCSD, 2013.
-
Abstract
- Pérez-González et al.<br />We present the Survey for High-z Absorption Red and Dead Sources (SHARDS), an ESO/GTC Large Program carried out using the OSIRIS instrument on the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC). SHARDS is an ultra-deep optical spectro-photometric survey of the GOODS-N field covering 130 arcmin2 at wavelengths between 500 and 950 nm with 24 contiguous medium-band filters (providing a spectral resolution R ∿ 50). The data reach an AB magnitude of 26.5 (at least at a 3σ level) with sub-arcsec seeing in all bands. SHARDS' main goal is to obtain accurate physical properties of intermediate- and high-z galaxies using well-sampled optical spectral energy distributions (SEDs) with sufficient spectral resolution to measure absorption and emission features, whose analysis will provide reliable stellar population and active galactic nucleus (AGN) parameters. Among the different populations of high-z galaxies, SHARDS' principal targets are massive quiescent galaxies at z > 1, whose existence is one of the major challenges facing current hierarchical models of galaxy formation. In this paper, we outline the observational strategy and include a detailed discussion of the special reduction and calibration procedures which should be applied to the GTC/OSIRIS data. An assessment of the SHARDS data quality is also performed. We present science demonstration results on the detection and study of emission-line galaxies (star-forming objects and AGNs) at z = 0-5. We also analyze the SEDs for a sample of 27 quiescent massive galaxies with spectroscopic redshifts in the range 1.0 < z ≲ 1.4. We discuss the improvements introduced by the SHARDS data set in the analysis of their star formation history and stellar properties. We discuss the systematics arising from the use of different stellar population libraries, typical in this kind of study. Averaging the results from the different libraries, we find that the UV-to-MIR SEDs of the massive quiescent galaxies at z = 1.0-1.4 are well described by an exponentially decaying star formation history with scale Ï„ = 100-200 Myr, age around 1.5-2.0 Gyr, solar or slightly sub-solar metallicity, and moderate extinction, A(V) ∿ 0.5 mag. We also find that galaxies with masses above M* are typically older than lighter galaxies, as expected in a downsizing scenario of galaxy formation. This trend is, however, model dependent, i.e., it is significantly more evident in the results obtained with some stellar population synthesis libraries, and almost absent in others. © 2013. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.<br />We acknowledge support from the Spanish Programa Nacional de Astronomía y Astrofísica under grants AYA2009-07723-E and AYA2009-10368. SHARDS has been funded by the Spanish MICINN/MINECO under the Consolider-Ingenio 2010 Program grant CSD2006-00070: First Science with the GTC. O.G.-M., C.M.-T., J.M.R.-E., and J.R.-Z. wish to acknowledge support from grant AYA2010-21887-C04-04. A.A.-H. and A.H.-C. acknowledge financial support from the Universidad de Cantabria through the Augusto G. Linares Program.
- Subjects :
- Astrofísica
Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.CO)
Stellar population
Metallicity
Extinction (astronomy)
FOS: Physical sciences
Astrophysics
Astrophysics::Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics
01 natural sciences
0103 physical sciences
Galaxy formation and evolution
Astrophysics::Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Spectral resolution
010303 astronomy & astrophysics
Astrophysics::Galaxy Astrophysics
Physics
[SDU.ASTR]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Astrophysics [astro-ph]
010308 nuclear & particles physics
Astrophysics::Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
Cosmology: observations, Galaxies: high-redshift, Galaxies: statistics, Large-scale structure of Universe
Física atmosférica
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Galaxy
Astronomía
Space and Planetary Science
Astrophysics::Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
Astrophysics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 0004637X and 15384357
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- The Astrophysical Journal, The Astrophysical Journal, American Astronomical Society, 2013, 762 (1), ⟨10.1088/0004-637X/762/1/46⟩, E-Prints Complutense. Archivo Institucional de la UCM, instname, E-Prints Complutense: Archivo Institucional de la UCM, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, The Astrophysical Journal, 2013, 762 (1), ⟨10.1088/0004-637X/762/1/46⟩, Digital.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....18ecc7d74ccb1b38a7983f6d6d3dce8b