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Abstract:

We aim at reproducing the mass- and sigma-[alpha/Fe] relations in the stellar populations of early-type galaxies by means of a cosmologically motivated assembly history for the spheroids. We implement a detailed treatment for the chemical evolution of H, He, O and Fe in GalICS, a semi-analytical model for galaxy formation which successfully reproduces basic low- and high-redshift galaxy properties. The contribution of supernovae (both type Ia and II) as well as low- and intermediate-mass stars to chemical feedback are taken into account. We find that this chemically improved GalICS does not produce the observed mass- and sigma-[alpha/Fe] relations. The slope is too shallow and scatter too large, in particular in the low and intermediate mass range. The model shows significant improvement at the highest masses and velocity dispersions, where the predicted [alpha/Fe] ratios are now marginally consistent with observed values. We show that this result comes from the implementation of AGN (plus halo) quenching of the star formation in massive haloes. A thorough exploration of the parameter space shows that the failure of reproducing the mass- and sigma-[alpha/Fe] relations can partly be attributed to the way in which star formation and feedback are currently modelled. The merger process is responsible for a part of the scatter. We suggest that the next generation of semi-analytical model should feature feedback (either stellar of from AGN) mechanisms linked to single galaxies and not only to the halo, especially in the low and intermediate mass range. The integral star formation history of a single galaxy determines its final stellar [alpha/Fe] as it might be expected from the results of closed box chemical evolution models. (abridged)

Abstract:

We have carried out a concept study for a wide-field monolithic integral field unit (IFU) spectrograph for extremely large telescopes (ELTs). We target in this paper the technological challenges that have to be faced in order to build such an instrument, focusing on the adaptive optics (AO) requirements, the image slicer technology, and the detectors status. We also address the main science drivers, together with the concept design and the expected performance applied to the European-ELT (E-ELT) case. A monolithic wide-field spectrograph provides a continuous field of view (FOV) separated by a field splitter in several subfields, each of them feeding a module featuring an image slicer, a collimator and a spectrograph. The use of image slicers provides 3D spectrographic images of the complete FOV, allowing for detection and study of sources without need of targeting them, a very useful property especially for the deep observation of faint high-redshift objects, whose density on the sky is expected to be quite high. In light of this discussion, we suggest the advantages of using shorter wavelengths and its implication in both the scientific program and the budget. © 2008. The Astronomical Society of the Pacific. All rights reserved.

Abstract:

The Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) is a second-generation instrument in development for the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO), due to begin operation in 2011/12. MUSE will be an extremely powerful integral-field spectrograph fed by a new multiple-laser adaptive optics system on the VLT. In its usual operating mode, MUSE will, in a single observation, produce a 3-dimensional data cube consisting of 90,000 R 3000 spectra, each covering a full spectral octave (480-930 nm), and fully sampling a contiguous 1×1 arcmin² field with 0.2×0.2 arcsec² apertures. A high-resolution mode will increase the spatial sampling to 0.025 arcsec per pixel. MUSE is built around a novel arrangement of 24 identical spectrographs (each comparable to a 1st generation VLT instrument), which are fed by a set of 24 precision image slicers. MUSE is designed for stability, with only 2 modes, and virtually no moving parts, allowing very long exposures to be accumulated. Together with high throughput, this ensures that MUSE will have extreme sensitivity for observing faint objects. We overview the technical and scientific aspects of MUSE, highlighting the key challenges for dealing with the unprecedented quantity and complexity of the data, and the integration with the VLT adaptive optics facility (AOF) - a key development on the path to extremely large telescopes (ELTs). © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.

Abstract:

We study numerically the formation of molecular clouds in large-scale colliding flows including self-gravity. The models emphasize the competition between the effects of gravity on global and local scales in an isolated cloud. Global gravity builds up large-scale filaments, while local gravity -- triggered by a combination of strong thermal and dynamical instabilities -- causes cores to form. The dynamical instabilities give rise to a local focusing of the colliding flows, facilitating the rapid formation of massive protostellar cores of a few 100 M$_\odot$. The forming clouds do not reach an equilibrium state, though the motions within the clouds appear comparable to ``virial''. The self-similar core mass distributions derived from models with and without self-gravity indicate that the core mass distribution is set very early on during the cloud formation process, predominantly by a combination of thermal and dynamical instabilities rather than by self-gravity.