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The identification of post-starburst galaxies at z~1 using multiwavelength photometry : a spectroscopic verification

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Date
11/06/2016
Author
Maltby, David T.
Almaini, Omar
Wild, Vivienne
Hatch, Nina A.
Hartley, William G.
Simpson, Chris
McLure, Ross J.
Dunlop, James
Rowlands, Kate
Cirasuolo, Michele
Keywords
Methods: statistical
Galaxies: fundamental paramaters
Galaxies: high-redshift
Galaxies: photometry
Galaxies: statistics
Galaxies: stellar content
QB Astronomy
QC Physics
NDAS
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Abstract
Despite decades of study, we still do not fully understand why somemassive galaxies abruptly switch off their star formation in the early Universe, and what causes their rapid transition to the red sequence.Post-starburst galaxies provide a rare opportunity to study this transition phase, but few have currently been spectroscopically identified at high redshift (z > 1). In this paper we present the spectroscopic verification of a new photometric technique to identify post-starbursts in high-redshift surveys. The method classifies the broad-band optical-near--infrared spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of galaxies using three spectral shape parameters (super-colours), derived from a principal component analysis of model SEDs. When applied to the multiwavelength photometric data in the UKIDSS Ultra Deep Survey (UDS), this technique identified over 900 candidate post-starbursts at redshifts 0.5<z<2.0. In this study we present deep opticalspectroscopy for a subset of these galaxies, in order to confirm their post-starburst nature. Where a spectroscopic assessment was possible, we find the majority (19/24 galaxies; ~80 per cent) exhibit the strong Balmer absorption (H δ equivalent width Wλ >5 Å) and Balmer break, characteristic of post-starburst galaxies. We conclude that photometric methods can be used to select large samples of recently-quenched galaxies in the distant Universe.
Citation
Maltby , D T , Almaini , O , Wild , V , Hatch , N A , Hartley , W G , Simpson , C , McLure , R J , Dunlop , J , Rowlands , K & Cirasuolo , M 2016 , ' The identification of post-starburst galaxies at z~1 using multiwavelength photometry : a spectroscopic verification ' , Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters , vol. 459 , no. 1 , pp. L114-L118 . https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slw057
Publication
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters
Status
Peer reviewed
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slw057
ISSN
1745-3925
Type
Journal article
Rights
© 2016, The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the final published version of the work, which was originally published at mnrasl.oxfordjournals.org / https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slw057
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  • University of St Andrews Research
URL
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016arXiv160308941M
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8694

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