Journal article
A geostatistical analysis of multiscale metallicity variations in galaxies – I. Introduction and comparison of high-resolution metallicity maps to an analytical metal transport model
B Metha, M Trenti, T Chu
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society | OXFORD UNIV PRESS | Published : 2021
Abstract
Thanks to recent advances in integral field spectroscopy, modern surveys of nearby galaxies are capable of resolving metallicity maps of H II regions down to scales of ∼50 pc. However, statistical analyses of these metallicity maps has seldom gone beyond fitting basic linear regressions and comparing parameters to global galaxy properties. In this paper (the first of a series), we introduce techniques from spatial statistics that are well suited for detailed analysis of both small- and large-scale metallicity variations within the interstellar medium (ISM) of local galaxies. As a first application, we compare the observed structure of small-scale metallicity fluctuations within seven local g..
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Grants
Awarded by Australian Research Council
Funding Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the anonymous referee for their constructive and informative feedback, which contributed to improve the quality and readability of this paper. The authors would further like to thank Prof. Mark Krumholz for several insightful clarifying discussions on the theoretical model investigated in this work; Ismael Pessa for providing determinations of the average SF densities within the galaxy sample; Dr. Leonid Pilyugin for providing data on the uncertainties associated with the Scal diagnostic; and Dr. Kathryn Kreckel for her insight regarding the metallicity gradients computed for the PHANGS sample. BM acknowledges support from an Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship. This research is supported in part by the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions (ASTRO 3D), through project number CE170100013.