Insights on Galaxy Evolution using ISM studies of Nearby Galaxies
Kathryn Kreckel (MPIA Heidelberg)
To understand how galaxies evolve we must understand the physical processes in the interstellar medium (ISM) that regulate their evolution. In this talk I will present results from KINGFISH, a Herschel survey of 61 nearby galaxies, and FISHPPAK, an optical integral field spectroscopic (IFS) survey matched to the KINGFISH sample. This combination of far-IR constraints, tracing the interstellar dust and the atomic and molecular emission, and optical spectroscopy, tracing the ionized ISM and stellar populations, provides a complete picture of the ISM at 200 pc scales. I will focus on two results.
I will show that we can use optical attenuation to trace the dust distribution at high spatial resolution, and discuss how the dust correlates with the star formation and the implications for understanding why stars form where they do. I will also show results mapping the physical conditions in the starburst driven galactic wind in NGC 2146, tracing the outflow from the launching region at the disk center out to 2.5 kpc above the galaxy disk, and discuss how the energetics and kinematics of the wind have implications for the evolutionary future of the system.
Coffee & Donuts served at 3:30pm in MP4045
