Calibration of Surface Brightness Fluctuations for WFC3/IR

Physics

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

Scientific paper

We aim to characterize galaxy surface brightness fluctuations {SBF}, and calibrate the SBF distance method, in the F110W and F160W filters of the Wide Field Camera 3 IR channel. Because of the very high throughput of F110W and the good match of F160W to the standard H band, we anticipate that both of these filters will be popular choices for galaxy observations with WFC3/IR. The SBF signal is typically an order of magnitude brighter in the near-IR than in the optical, and the characterisitics {sensitivity, FOV, cosmetics} of the WFC3/IR channel will be enormously more efficient for SBF measurements than previously available near-IR cameras. As a result, our proposed SBF calibration will allow accurate distance derivation whenever an early-type or bulge-dominated galaxy is observed out to a distance of 150 Mpc or more {i.e., out to the Hubble flow} in the calibrated passbands. For individual galaxy observations, an accurate distance is useful for establishing absolute luminosities, black hole masses, linear sizes, etc. Eventually, once a large number of galaxies have been observed across the sky with WFC3/IR, this SBF calibration will enable accurate mapping of the total mass density distribution in the local universe using the data available in the HST archive. The proposed observations will have additional important scientific value; in particular, we highlight their usefulness for understanding the nature of multimodal globular cluster color distributions in giant elliptical galaxies.;

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Calibration of Surface Brightness Fluctuations for WFC3/IR does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Calibration of Surface Brightness Fluctuations for WFC3/IR, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Calibration of Surface Brightness Fluctuations for WFC3/IR will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1320492

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.