Correlations among color,morphology, and luminosity for the luminous red galaxy (LRG) sample of the SDSS data release 5

We have investigated the correlations among color, morphology and luminosity for all LRGs, cut I LRGs, cut II LRGs, and Main galaxies that are also classified as LRGs. It is found that the morphology of LRGs is tightly correlated with luminosity. The rest-frame u-g color of cut I LRGs and cut II LRGs is nearly independent of luminosity, but the color of Main galaxies is correlated with luminosity. For cut I LRGs and Main galaxies, the early type proportion apparently changes with color: at the rest-frame u-g < 1.3 it increases strongly with increasing color, while at the rest-frame u-g > 1.3 it decreases with increasing color. We also notice that the morphology of cut II LRGs is only a weak function of color. Published in Astrofizika, Vol. 50, No. 3, pp. 335–345 (August 2007).     

Dependence of the holmberg effect on separations between paired galaxies

To investigate the dependence of the Holmberg effect of paired galaxies on three-dimensional separations, we have constructed four subsamples characterized by three-dimensional separations s ≤ 50 kpc, 50 kpc < s ≤ 100 kpc , 100kpc < s ≤150kpc , and 150 kpc < s ≤ 200 kpc , respectively. In this study, linear correlation coefficients and surplus standard deviations of color indices, luminosity, and size between two components of paired galaxies are calculated. It is found that there is a weak tendency for correlation coefficients of color indices to increase with decreasing three-dimensional separations, but such a tendency does not exist for ones of luminosity and size. We also note that there is no tendency for surplus standard deviations to decrease with decreasing three-dimensional separations. This suggests that it is still very difficult to clearly affirm the dependence of the Holmberg Effect of paired galaxies on three-dimensional separations.     

Comparison of some properties of star forming galaxies and active galactic nuclei between two BOSS galaxy samples from SDSS DR9

Using the LOWZ and CMASS samples of the ninth data release(DR9)from the SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey(BOSS), I investigate properties of star forming galaxies and active galactic nuclei(AGNs). The CMASS sample seriously suffers from the radial selection effect, even within the redshift0.44 ≤ z ≤ 0.6, which will likely lead to statistical conclusions in the CMASS sample being less robust. In the LOWZ sample, the fraction of star-forming galaxies is nearly constant from the least dense regime to the densest regime; the AGN fraction is also insensitive to the local environment. In addition, I note that in the LOWZ sample, the distributions of stellar mass and stellar velocity dispersion for star forming galaxies and AGNs are nearly the same.     

Color dependence of clustering properties of Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs)

From the approximately volume-limited Luminous Red Galaxy (LRG) sample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6 (SDSS DR6), we construct three LRG samples with different g-r color, which have the nearly same number density, to investigate the color dependence of clustering properties of LRGs. It is found that the blue galaxies have a more filamentary distribution than red galaxies, and that the bluest LRGs preferentially inhabit the dense groups and clusters. But in three LRG samples with different u-g color, we do not observe the tendency for clustering properties of LRGs to significantly change with color. We preferentially conclude that the clustering properties of LRGs are not strongly correlated with colors.     

Correlations between environment and other properties of galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey at fixed color

From the volume-limited Main galaxy sample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6 (SDSS DR6), we construct three samples with g–r color bins , labeled S1–S3, to investigate how other properties of galaxies depend on environment at fixed color. For each sample, we measure the local three-dimensional galaxy density in a comoving sphere with radius equal to the distance to the 5th nearest galaxy for each galaxy, select about 5% galaxies and construct the two subsamples at both extremes of density. Our study suggests that the environmental dependence of luminosity is mainly due to the environmental dependence of galaxy color and the correlation between color and luminosity. In addition, we preferentially conclude that concentration index and morphologies are not strongly correlated with local density at fixed color, and that galaxy color is a galaxy property very predictive of the local environment. Because SDSS spectroscopy is incomplete for bright galaxies at very low redshifts, we also use a volume-limited Main galaxy sample with a lower redshift limit z = 0.05, which contains 94,954 galaxies at 0.05 < z < 0.089 with −22.40 < M_r < −20.16, and reach the same conclusions.Due to the bimodality of the u–r color distribution, we classify galaxies as ‘red’ and ‘blue’, respectively, and further subdivide the samples into star-forming galaxies and passive ones using Hα equivalent width, W₀(Hα). Results show that color and star formation activity of galaxies are galaxy properties very predictive of the local environment.     

Investigation of the correlation between morphology and luminosity for two classes of main galaxies

Using an apparent-magnitude limited Main galaxy sample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7(SDSS DR7), we investigate the correlation between morphologies and luminosity for the Main galaxy sample. Our Main galaxy sample is divided into two classes: Main galaxies only with TARGET_GALAXY flag (bestPrimtarget = 64), and ones also with other flags. It is found that for the second class Main galaxies, the early-type proportion monotonously increases with increasing luminosity nearly in the whole luminosity region. But for the first class Main galaxies, the early-type proportion increases with increasing luminosity only within a certain luminosity region (−22.2 < M _r  < −19.8). In the high luminosity region (M _r  < −22.2), the early-type proportion of the first class Main galaxies even decreases dramatically with increasing luminosity. We also analyze the correlation between morphologies and luminosity of galaxies around the peak of the redshift distribution ( 0.07 ≤ z ≤ 0.08 ). In such a narrow redshift region, we still observe strong correlation between morphologies and luminosity, which shows that this correlation is fundamental.     

Correlations between morphology and other galaxy parameters at different environmental density levels

Using two volume-limited samples above and below the value of $M_{r}^{ *}$ constructed from the Main galaxy sample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 8 (SDSS DR8), we investigate correlations between galaxy morphology and star formation rate (SFR), specific star formation rate (SSFR) and stellar mass at different environmental density levels. For each sample, three subsamples at both density extremes and at the median density are selected. We found that examining either of our two volume-limited Main samples leads to the same conclusion: at different environmental density levels, SFR, SSFR and stellar mass are strongly correlated with galaxy morphology, which shows that SFR, SSFR and stellar mass of a galaxy depend on its environment as well as its morphology.     

The color properties of compact groups of main galaxies from the SDSS Data Release 4

In order to compare color statistical properties of member galaxies in compact groups with those of field galaxies, we use a compact group (CG) sample which contains 4217 CGs extracted from the MAIN galaxy sample of the SDSS Data Release 4 (SDSS4), and construct a random group sample which has the same distributions of redshift and number of member galaxies as those of the CG sample. It turns out that the mean colors of galaxies in CGs are redder than those of galaxies in random groups. Additionally, we also find that member galaxies in real CGs have a smaller dispersion of colors than those in random groups-at least for g-r, r-i, and i-z colors. Published in Astrofizika, Vol. 50, No. 1, pp. 29–37 (February 2007).