Search NASA⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Behroozi, Peter S

Publications and source records attributed to Behroozi, Peter S.

12 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2013

ON THE LACK OF EVOLUTION IN GALAXY STAR FORMATION EFFICIENCY

Using reconstructed galaxy star formation histories, we calculate the instantaneous efficiency of galaxy star formation (i.e., the star formation rate divided by the baryon accretion rate) from z = 8 to the present day. This efficiency exhibits a clear peak near a characteristic halo mass of 10{sup 11.7} M{sub Sun }, which coincides with longstanding theoretical predictions for the mass scale relevant to virial shock heating of accreted gas. Above the characteristic halo mass, the efficiency falls off as the mass to the minus four-thirds power; below the characteristic mass, the efficiency falls off at an average scaling of mass to the two-thirds power. By comparison, the shape and normalization of the efficiency change very little since z = 4. We show that a time-independent star formation efficiency simply explains the shape of the cosmic star formation rate since z = 4 in terms of dark matter accretion rates. The rise in the cosmic star formation from early times until z = 2 is especially sensitive to galaxy formation efficiency. The mass dependence of the efficiency strongly limits where most star formation occurs, with the result that two-thirds of all star formation has occurred inside halos within a factor of three of the characteristic mass, a range that includes the mass of the Milky Way.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

The Connection between Galaxies and Dark Matter Structures in the Local Universe

We provide new constraints on the connection between galaxies in the local Universe, identified by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), and dark matter halos and their constituent substructures in the {Lambda}CDM model using WMAP7 cosmological parameters. Predictions for the abundance and clustering properties of dark matter halos, and the relationship between dark matter hosts and substructures, are based on a high-resolution cosmological simulation, the Bolshoi simulation. We associate galaxies with dark matter halos and subhalos using subhalo abundance matching, and perform a comprehensive analysis which investigates the underlying assumptions of this technique including (a) which halo property is most closely associated with galaxy stellar masses and luminosities, (b) how much scatter is in this relationship, and (c) how much subhalos can be stripped before their galaxies are destroyed. The models are jointly constrained by new measurements of the projected two-point galaxy clustering and the observed conditional stellar mass function of galaxies in groups. We find that an abundance matching model that associates galaxies with the peak circular velocity of their halos is in good agreement with the data, when scatter of 0.20 {+-} 0.03 dex in stellar mass at a given peak velocity is included. This confirms the theoretical expectation that the stellar mass of galaxies is tightly correlated with the potential wells of their dark matter halos before they are impacted by larger structures. The data put tight constraints on the satellite fraction of galaxies as a function of galaxy stellar mass and on the scatter between halo and galaxy properties, and rule out several alternative abundance matching models that have been considered. This will yield important constraints for galaxy formation models, and also provides encouraging indications that the galaxy - halo connection can be modeled with sufficient fidelity for future precision studies of the dark Universe.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2012

THE INTEGRATED STELLAR CONTENT OF DARK MATTER HALOS

Measurements of the total amount of stars locked up in galaxies as a function of host halo mass contain key clues about the efficiency of processes that regulate star formation. We derive the total stellar mass fraction f{sub *} (excluding stars in the intracluster light) as a function of halo mass M{sub 500c} from z = 0.2 to z = 1 using two complementary methods. First, we derive f{sub *} using a statistical Halo Occupation Distribution model jointly constrained by data from lensing, clustering, and the stellar mass function. This method enables us to probe f{sub *} over a much wider halo mass range than with group or cluster catalogs. Second, we derive f{sub *} at group scales using a COSMOS X-ray group catalog and show that the two methods agree to within 30%. We quantify the systematic uncertainty on f{sub *} using abundance matching methods and show that the statistical uncertainty on f{sub *} ({approx}10%) is dwarfed by systematic uncertainties associated with stellar mass measurements ({approx}45% excluding initial mass function, IMF, uncertainties). Assuming a Chabrier IMF, we find 0.012 {<=} f{sub *} {<=} 0.025 at M{sub 500c} = 10{sup 13} M{sub Sun} and 0.0057 {<=} f{sub *} {<=} 0.015 at M{sub 500c} = 10{sup 14} M{sub Sun }. These values are significantly lower than previously published estimates. We investigate the cause of this difference and find that previous work has overestimated f{sub *} owing to a combination of inaccurate stellar mass estimators and/or because they have assumed that all galaxies in groups are early-type galaxies with a constant mass-to-light ratio. Contrary to previous claims, our results suggest that the mean value of f{sub *} is always significantly lower than f{sub gas} for halos above 10{sup 13} M{sub Sun }. Combining our results with recently published gas mass fractions, we find a shortfall in f{sub *} + f{sub gas} at R{sub 500c} compared to the cosmic mean. This shortfall varies with halo mass and becomes larger toward lower halo masses.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

STATISTICS OF SATELLITE GALAXIES AROUND MILKY-WAY-LIKE HOSTS

We calculate the probability that a Milky-Way (MW)-like halo in the standard cosmological model has the observed number of Magellanic Clouds (MCs). The statistics of the number of MCs in the lambda cold dark matter model are in good agreement with observations of a large sample of Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) galaxies. Under the subhalo abundance matching assumption of a relationship with small scatter between galaxy r-band luminosities and halo internal velocities v{sub max}, we make detailed comparisons to similar measurements using SDSS Data Release 7 data by Liu et al. Models and observational data give very similar probabilities for having zero, one, and two MC-like satellites. In both cases, MW luminosity hosts have just a {approx}10% chance of hosting two satellites similar to the MCs. In addition, we present a prediction for the probability for a host galaxy to have N{sub sats} satellite galaxies as a function of the magnitudes of both the host and satellite. This probability and its scaling with host properties is significantly different from that of mass-selected objects because of scatter in the mass-luminosity relation and because of variations in the star formation efficiency with halo mass.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

GALAXIES IN X-RAY GROUPS. I. ROBUST MEMBERSHIP ASSIGNMENT AND THE IMPACT OF GROUP ENVIRONMENTS ON QUENCHING

Understanding the mechanisms that lead dense environments to host galaxies with redder colors, more spheroidal morphologies, and lower star formation rates than field populations remains an important problem. As most candidate processes ultimately depend on host halo mass, accurate characterizations of the local environment, ideally tied to halo mass estimates and spanning a range in halo mass and redshift, are needed. In this work, we present and test a rigorous, probabilistic method for assigning galaxies to groups based on precise photometric redshifts and X-ray-selected groups drawn from the COSMOS field. The groups have masses in the range 10{sup 13} {approx}< M{sub 200c}/M{sub Sun} {approx}< 10{sup 14} and span redshifts 0 < z < 1. We characterize our selection algorithm via tests on spectroscopic subsamples, including new data obtained at the Very Large Telescope, and by applying our method to detailed mock catalogs. We find that our group member galaxy sample has a purity of 84% and completeness of 92% within 0.5 R{sub 200c}. We measure the impact of uncertainties in redshifts and group centering on the quality of the member selection with simulations based on current data as well as future imaging and spectroscopic surveys. As a first application of our new group member catalog which will be made publicly available, we show that member galaxies exhibit a higher quenched fraction compared to the field at fixed stellar mass out to z {approx} 1, indicating a significant relationship between star formation and environment at group scales. We also address the suggestion that dusty star-forming galaxies in such groups may impact the high-l power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background and find that such a population cannot explain the low power seen in recent Sunyaev-Zel'dovich measurements.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

A THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK FOR COMBINING TECHNIQUES THAT PROBE THE LINK BETWEEN GALAXIES AND DARK MATTER

We develop a theoretical framework that combines measurements of galaxy-galaxy lensing, galaxy clustering, and the galaxy stellar mass function in a self-consistent manner. While considerable effort has been invested in exploring each of these probes individually, attempts to combine them are still in their infancy. These combinations have the potential to elucidate the galaxy-dark matter connection and the galaxy formation physics responsible for it, as well as to constrain cosmological parameters and to test the nature of gravity. In this paper, we focus on a theoretical model that describes the galaxy-dark matter connection based on standard halo occupation distribution techniques. Several key modifications enable us to extract additional parameters that determine the stellar-to-halo mass relation and to simultaneously fit data from multiple probes while allowing for independent binning schemes for each probe. We construct mock catalogs from numerical simulations to investigate the effects of sample variance and covariance for each probe. Finally, we analyze how trends in each of the three observables impact the derived parameters of the model. In particular, we investigate various features of the observed galaxy stellar mass function (low-mass slope, 'plateau', knee, and high-mass cutoff) and show how each feature is related to the underlying relationship between stellar and halo mass. We demonstrate that the observed 'plateau' feature in the stellar mass function at M{sub *} {approx} 2 x 10{sup 10} M{sub sun} is due to the transition that occurs in the stellar-to-halo mass relation at M{sub h} {approx} 10{sup 12} M{sub sun} from a low-mass power-law regime to a sub-exponential function at higher stellar mass.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

HOW COMMON ARE THE MAGELLANIC CLOUDS?

We introduce a probabilistic approach to the problem of counting dwarf satellites around host galaxies in databases with limited redshift information. This technique is used to investigate the occurrence of satellites with luminosities similar to the Magellanic Clouds around hosts with properties similar to the Milky Way (MW) in the object catalog of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). Our analysis uses data from SDSS Data Release 7, selecting candidate MW-like hosts from the spectroscopic catalog and candidate analogs of the Magellanic Clouds from the photometric catalog. Our principal result is the probability for an MW-like galaxy to host N{sub sat} close satellites with luminosities similar to the Magellanic Clouds. We find that 81% of galaxies like the MW have no such satellites within a radius of 150 kpc, 11% have one, and only 3.5% of hosts have two. The probabilities are robust to changes in host and satellite selection criteria, background-estimation technique, and survey depth. These results demonstrate that the MW has significantly more satellites than a typical galaxy of its luminosity; this fact is useful for understanding the larger cosmological context of our home galaxy.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗