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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Statistical Effects Of Synthetic Template Mismatch With Model Deimos Observations, Christos Kakogiannis Jun 2022

Statistical Effects Of Synthetic Template Mismatch With Model Deimos Observations, Christos Kakogiannis

Honors Theses

High-precision kinematics of individual stars in Milky Way satellite galaxies and globular clusters is crucial for studies of galaxy formation, cosmology, alternative gravity models, and dark matter. We tested a rigorous method that matches model DEIMOS observations of such targets with synthetic template spectra that deduces radial velocities and [Fe/H] abundances. We added noise to create a model spectrum with SNR = 30, fitted templates with different parameters to it, and calculated the
best-match velocity and the goodness of the fit. The best fits occur for templates that are close in parameter space to the model spectrum, and the fits …


Investigating The Agn-Merger Connection Using Close Galaxy Pairs In The Candels Fields, Sean L. Dougherty Jan 2021

Investigating The Agn-Merger Connection Using Close Galaxy Pairs In The Candels Fields, Sean L. Dougherty

Honors Theses

Galaxy mergers are catastrophic events in that they greatly change the properties of the galaxies involved. Observations of the nearby universe suggest that they may also be able to trigger active galactic nuclei (AGN) even prior to the final coalescence, though there is much controversy surrounding this belief, particularly at high redshifts. In order to address this question, we have assembled a large sample of photometric galaxy pairs within the GDS and EGS fields of the CANDELS survey. We use photometric redshift probability distribution functions and the combined redshift probability function to assign probabilities for each projected pair. We incorporate …


Finding Obscure Black Hole Growth Via Spectral Energy Distribution Modeling, Randall K. Chan Jan 2019

Finding Obscure Black Hole Growth Via Spectral Energy Distribution Modeling, Randall K. Chan

Honors Theses

An active galactic nucleus (AGN) occurs when the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy starts to grow. We still currently do not know what triggers AGN. Theories suggest that galaxy mergers could trigger AGNs, but past research has not been able to find a correlation between x-ray detected AGNs and disturbed galaxies. The present research looks specifically at AGN not detected in the x-ray, or obscured AGN. Using a newly updated IDL code, FAST, we were able to identify potential obscured AGN through spectral energy distribution (SED) modeling. We found a total of 526 obscured AGN in …


Massive Quiescent Disk Galaxies In The Candels Survey, Aurora Y. Kesseli Jan 2013

Massive Quiescent Disk Galaxies In The Candels Survey, Aurora Y. Kesseli

Honors Theses

We used data from the GOODS-S field of the CANDELS survey in order to confirm previous studies that found that large fractions of high-redshift galaxies (z ∼ 2) are disk-dominated (McGrath et al. 2008; van der Wel et al. 2011). In the GOODS-S field we selected out all the massive quiescent disk galaxies by imposing a mass limit of M > 1010M and a redshift range of 0.5 ≤ z ≤ 2.5, and then choosing the quiescent red galaxies from a color-color plot. Once we had our sample, we did a qualitative visual classification of each galaxy and …