Bibcode
Sánchez-Menguiano, L.; Sánchez, S. F.; Pérez, I.; Debattista, V. P.; Ruiz-Lara, T.; Florido, E.; Cavichia, O.; Galbany, L.; Marino, R. A.; Mast, D.; Sánchez-Blázquez, P.; Méndez-Abreu, J.; de Lorenzo-Cáceres, A.; Catalán-Torrecilla, C.; Cano-Díaz, M.; Márquez, I.; McIntosh, D. H.; Ascasibar, Y.; García-Benito, R.; Gónzalez Delgado, R. M.; Kehrig, C.; López-Sánchez, Á. R.; Mollá, M.; Bland-Hawthorn, J.; Walcher, C. J.; Costantin, L.
Bibliographical reference
Astronomy and Astrophysics, Volume 603, id.A113, 13 pp.
Advertised on:
7
2017
Journal
Citations
26
Refereed citations
25
Description
Spiral arms are the most singular features in disc galaxies. These
structures can exhibit different patterns, namely grand design and
flocculent arms, with easily distinguishable characteristics. However,
their origin and the mechanisms shaping them are unclear. The overall
role of spirals in the chemical evolution of disc galaxies is another
unsolved question. In particular, it has not been fully explored if the
H ii regions of spiral arms present different properties from those
located in the interarm regions. Here we analyse the radial oxygen
abundance gradient of the arm and interarm star forming regions of 63
face-on spiral galaxies using CALIFA Integral Field Spectroscopy data.
We focus the analysis on three characteristic parameters of the profile:
slope, zero-point, and scatter. The sample is morphologically separated
into flocculent versus grand design spirals and barred versus unbarred
galaxies. We find subtle but statistically significant differences
betweenthe arm and interarm distributions for flocculent galaxies,
suggesting that the mechanisms generating the spiral structure in these
galaxies may be different to those producing grand design systems, for
which no significant differences are found. We also find small
differences in barred galaxies, not observed in unbarred systems,
hinting that bars may affect the chemical distribution of these galaxies
but not strongly enough as to be reflected in the overall abundance
distribution. In light of these results, we propose bars and flocculent
structure as two distinct mechanisms inducing differences in the
abundance distribution between arm and interarm star forming regions.
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