First science with SAMI: a serendipitously discovered Galactic wind in ESO 185-G031

Lisa M. R. Fogarty, Joss Bland-Hawthorn, Scott M. Croom, Andrew W. Green, Julia J. Bryant, Jon S. Lawrence, Samuel Richards, James T. Allen, Amanda E. Bauer, Michael N. Birchall, Sarah Brough, Matthew Colless, Simon C. Ellis, Tony Farrell, Michael Goodwin, Ron Heald, Andrew M. Hopkins, Anthony Horton, D. Heath Jones, Steve LeeGeraint Lewis, Ángel R. López-Sánchez, Stan Miziarski, Holly Trowland, Sergio G. Leon-Saval, Seong Sik Min, Christopher Trinh, Gerald Cecil, Sylvain Veilleux, Kory Kreimeyer

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    39 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    We present the first scientific results from the Sydney-AAO Multi-Object IFS (SAMI) at the Anglo-Australian Telescope. This unique instrument deploys 13 fused fiber bundles (hexabundles) across a one-degree field of view allowing simultaneous spatially resolved spectroscopy of 13 galaxies. During the first SAMI commissioning run, targeting a single galaxy field, one object (ESO 185-G031) was found to have extended minor axis emission with ionization and kinematic properties consistent with a large-scale galactic wind. The importance of this result is twofold: (1) fiber bundle spectrographs are able to identify low surface brightness emission arising from extranuclear activity and (2) such activity may be more common than presently assumed because conventional multi-object spectrographs use single-aperture fibers and spectra from these are nearly always dominated by nuclear emission. These early results demonstrate the extraordinary potential of multi-object hexabundle spectroscopy in future galaxy surveys.

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number169
    Pages (from-to)1-12
    Number of pages12
    JournalAstrophysical Journal
    Volume761
    Issue number2
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 10 Dec 2012

    Keywords

    • galaxies: evolution
    • galaxies: individual (ESO 185-G031)
    • galaxies: kinematics and dynamics
    • galaxies: star formation
    • techniques: imaging spectroscopy

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'First science with SAMI: a serendipitously discovered Galactic wind in ESO 185-G031'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this