Gregory Hallenbeck

The Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA Survey: the α.40 H I source catalog, its characteristics and their impact on the derivation of the H I mass function

We present a current catalog of 21 cm H I line sources extracted from the Arecibo Legacy Fast Arecibo L-band Feed Array (ALFALFA) survey over ~2800 deg^2 of sky: the α.40 catalog. Covering 40% of the final survey area, the α.40 catalog contains 15,855 sources in the regions 07^h30^m < R.A. < 16^h30^m, +04° < decl. <+16°, and +24° < decl. <+28° and 22^h < R.A. < 03^h, +14° < decl. <+16°, and +24° < decl. < + 32°. Of those, 15,041 are certainly extragalactic, yielding a source density of 5.3 galaxies per deg^2, a factor of 29 improvement over the catalog extracted from the H I Parkes All-Sky Survey. In addition to the source centroid positions, H I line flux densities, recessional velocities, and line widths, the catalog includes the coordinates of the most probable optical counterpart of each H I line detection, and a separate compilation provides a cross-match to identifications given in the photometric and spectroscopic catalogs associated with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7. Fewer than 2% of the extragalactic H I line sources cannot be identified with a feasible optical counterpart; some of those may be rare OH megamasers at 0.16 < z < 0.25. A detailed analysis is presented of the completeness, width-dependent sensitivity function and bias inherent of the α.40 catalog. The impact of survey selection, distance errors, current volume coverage, and local large-scale structure on the derivation of the H I mass function is assessed. While α.40 does not yet provide a completely representative sampling of cosmological volume, derivations of the H I mass function using future data releases from ALFALFA will further improve both statistical and systematic uncertainties.

The ALFALFA "Almost Darks" Campaign: Pilot VLA HI Observations of Five High Mass-to-Light Ratio Systems

We present new Very Large Array (VLA) H i spectral line imaging of five sources discovered by the ALFALFA extragalactic survey. These targets are drawn from a larger sample of systems that were not uniquely identified with optical counterparts during ALFALFA processing, and as such have unusually high H i mass to light ratios. The candidate “Almost Dark” objects fall into four broad categories: (1) objects with nearby H i neighbors that are likely of tidal origin; (2) objects that appear to be part of a system of multiple H i sources, but which may not be tidal in origin; (3) objects isolated from nearby ALFALFA H i detections, but located near a gas-poor early type galaxy; (4) apparently isolated sources, with no object of coincident redshift within ˜400 kpc. Roughly 75% of the 200 objects without identified counterparts in the α.40 database (Haynes et al. 2011) fall into category 1 (likely tidal), and were not considered for synthesis follow-up observations. The pilot sample presented here (AGC193953, AGC208602, AGC208399, AGC226178, and AGC233638) contains the first five sources observed as part of a larger effort to characterize H i sources with no readily identifiable optical counterpart at single dish resolution (3.‧5). These objects span a range of H i mass [7.41 <log(MHi ) <9.51] and H i mass to B-band luminosity ratios (3 <MHi /LB <9). We compare the H i total intensity and velocity fields to optical imaging drawn from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and to ultraviolet imaging drawn from archival GALEX observations. Four of the sources with uncertain or no optical counterpart in the ALFALFA data are identified with low surface brightness optical counterparts in Sloan Digital Sky Survey imaging when compared with VLA H i intensity maps, and appear to be galaxies with clear signs of ordered rotation in the H i velocity fields. Three of these are detected in far-ultraviolet GALEX images, a likely indication of star formation within the last few hundred Myrs. One source (AGC208602) is likely tidal in nature, associated with the NGC 3370 group. Consistent with previous efforts, we find no “dark galaxies” in this limited sample. However, the present observations do reveal complex sources with suppressed star formation, highlighting both the observational difficulties and the necessity of synthesis follow-up observations to understand these extreme objects.

HIghMass-High HI Mass, HI-Rich Galaxies at z~0 Sample Definition, Optical and H alpha imaging, and star formation properties

We present first results of the study of a set of exceptional H I sources identified in the 40% ALFALFA extragalactic H I survey catalog α.40 as both being H I massive (

Gas-Bearing Early-Type Dwarf Galaxies in Virgo: Evidence for Recent Accretion

M_{{\rm H}\,\scriptsize{I}} \gt 10^{10}\, M_\odot

Model discrimination at the LHC: A case study

) and having high gas fractions for their stellar masses: the HIghMass galaxy sample. We analyze UV- and optical-broadband and Hα images to understand the nature of their relatively underluminous disks in optical and to test whether their high gas fractions can be tracked to higher dark matter halo spin parameters or late gas accretion. Estimates of their star formation rates (SFRs) based on spectral energy distribution fitting agree within uncertainties with the Hα luminosity inferred current massive SFRs. The H II region luminosity functions, parameterized as dN/dlog LvpropL α, have standard slopes at the luminous end (α ~ –1). The global SFRs demonstrate that the HIghMass galaxies exhibit active ongoing star formation (SF) with moderate SF efficiency but, relative to normal spirals, a lower integrated SFR in the past. Because the SF activity in these systems is spread throughout their extended disks, they have overall lower SFR surface densities and lower surface brightness in the optical bands. Relative to normal disk galaxies, the majority of HIghMass galaxies have higher Hα equivalent widths and are bluer in their outer disks, implying an inside-out disk growth scenario. Downbending double exponential disks are more frequent than upbending disks among the gas-rich galaxies, suggesting that SF thresholds exist in the downbending disks, probably as a result of concentrated gas distribution.

THE H i CONTENT OF GALAXIES IN GROUPS AND CLUSTERS AS MEASURED BY ALFALFA

We investigate the dwarf (M_B> -16) galaxies in the Virgo cluster in the radio, optical, and ultraviolet regimes. Of the 365 galaxies in this sample, 80 have been detected in HI by the Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA survey. These detections include 12 early-type dwarfs which have HI and stellar masses similar to the cluster dwarf irregulars and BCDs. In this sample of 12, half have star-formation properties similar to late type dwarfs, while the other half are quiescent like typical early-type dwarfs. We also discuss three possible mechanisms for their evolution: that they are infalling field galaxies that have been or are currently being evolved by the cluster, that they are stripped objects whose gas is recycled, and that the observed HI has been recently reaccreted. Evolution by the cluster adequately explains the star-forming half of the sample, but the quiescent class of early-type dwarfs is most consistent with having recently reaccreted their gas.

HIghMass—HIGH H I MASS, H I-RICH GALAXIES AT z ∼ 0 HIGH-RESOLUTION VLA IMAGING OF UGC 9037 AND UGC 12506

We investigate the potential of the compact muon solenoid detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) to discriminate between two theoretical models predicting anomalous events with jets and large missing transverse energy, minimal supersymmetry, and little Higgs with T parity. We focus on a simple test-case scenario, in which the only exotic particles produced at the LHC are heavy color-triplet states (squarks or T quarks), and the only open decay channel for these particles is into the stable missing-energy particle (neutralino or heavy photon) plus a quark. We find that in this scenario, the angular and momentum distributions of the observed jets are sufficient to discriminate between the two models with a few inverse femtobarns of the LHC data, provided that these distributions for both models and the dominant standard model backgrounds can be reliably predicted by Monte Carlo simulations.

The Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA Survey: The ALFALFA Extragalactic H i Source Catalog

We present the HI content of galaxies in nearby groups and clusters as measured by the 70% complete Arecibo Legacy Fast-ALFA (ALFALFA) survey, including constraints from ALFALFA detection limits. Our sample includes 22 systems at distances between 70-160 Mpc over the mass range 12.5<log M/M_sun<15.0, for a total of 1986 late-type galaxies. We find that late-type galaxies in the centers of groups lack HI at fixed stellar mass relative to the regions surrounding them. Larger groups show evidence of a stronger dependence of HI properties on environment, despite a similar dependence of color on environment at fixed stellar mass. We compare several environment variables to determine which is the best predictor of galaxy properties; group-centric distance r and r/R_200 are similarly effective predictors, while local density is slightly more effective and group size and halo mass are slightly less effective. While both central and satellite galaxies in the blue cloud exhibit a significant dependence of HI content on local density, only centrals show a strong dependence on stellar mass, and only satellites show a strong dependence on halo mass. Finally, we see evidence that HI is deficient for blue cloud galaxies in denser environments even when both stellar mass and color are fixed. This is consistent with a picture where HI is removed or destroyed, followed by reddening within the blue cloud. Our results support the existence of pre-processing in isolated groups, along with an additional rapid mechanism for gas removal within larger groups and clusters, perhaps ram-pressure stripping.

HIghMass - High HI Mass, HI-Rich Galaxies at

We present resolved HI observations of two galaxies, UGC 9037 and UGC 12506, members of a rare subset of galaxies detected by the ALFALFA extragalactic HI survey characterized by high HI mass and high gas fraction for their stellar masses. Both of these galaxies have M

z\sim0

_*>10^{10}