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The gas-phase metallicity distribution within galaxies records critical information about galactic evolution. In this work we investigate how active galactic nuclei (AGN) influence this distribution by measuring the two-point correlation functions of gas-phase metallicity in 95 non-AGN and 37 AGN-host galaxies from the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field spectroscopy Area integral field spectrographic survey. We measure metallicity using a novel Bayesian method that properly includes both stellar and AGN contributions to emission line fluxes and allows us to measure metallicities in both AGN-host and non-AGN galaxies in a single, consistent framework. We find that the two-point correlation functions of both AGN-host and non-AGN galaxies are well-fit by a simple injection-diffusion model, and that the correlation lengths $l_\mathrm{corr}$ we derive for the non-AGN galaxies are reasonably consistent with those obtained in earlier work. The AGN-host galaxies generally have smaller $l_\mathrm{corr}$ than non-AGN galaxies at fixed stellar mass, but similar $l_\mathrm{corr}$ at fixed star formation rate (SFR), suggesting that the primary effect of hosting an AGN in this sample is a reduction in SFR at fixed stellar mass, and that this in turn suppresses the correlation length. Our findings further indicate that, while both SFR and stellar mass are positively correlated with metallicity correlation length $l_\mathrm{corr}$, the former is more fundamental, implying that fluctuations in the metallicity distribution within galaxies are driven more by short-term responses to physical processes such as star formation that can change much faster than a Hubble time., Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, submitted to MNRAS

We present the Sloan Digital Sky Survey V (SDSS-V) Local Volume Mapper (LVM). The LVM is an integral-field spectroscopic survey of the Milky Way, Magellanic Clouds, and of a sample of local volume galaxies, connecting resolved pc-scale individual sources of feedback to kpc-scale ionized interstellar medium (ISM) properties. The 4-year survey covers the southern Milky Way disk at spatial resolutions of 0.05 to 1 pc, the Magellanic Clouds at 10 pc resolution, and nearby large galaxies at larger scales totaling $>4300$ square degrees of sky, and more than 55M spectra. It utilizes a new facility of alt-alt mounted siderostats feeding 16 cm refractive telescopes, lenslet-coupled fiber-optics, and spectrographs covering 3600-9800A at R ~ 4000. The ultra-wide field IFU has a diameter of 0.5 degrees with 1801 hexagonally packed fibers of 35.3 arcsec apertures. The siderostats allow for a completely stationary fiber system, avoiding instability of the line spread function seen in traditional fiber feeds. Scientifically, LVM resolves the regions where energy, momentum, and chemical elements are injected into the ISM at the scale of gas clouds, while simultaneously charting where energy is being dissipated (via cooling, shocks, turbulence, bulk flows, etc.) to global scales. This combined local and global view enables us to constrain physical processes regulating how stellar feedback operates and couples to galactic kinematics and disk-scale structures, such as the bar and spiral arms, as well as gas in- and out-flows., Comment: 29 pages, 12 figures, accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journal

The Universe is shaped as a web-like structure, formed by clusters, filaments, and walls that leave large volumes in between named voids. Galaxies in voids have been found to be of a later type, bluer, less massive, and to have a slower evolution than galaxies in denser environments (filaments and walls). However, the effect of the void environment on their stellar population properties is still unclear. We aim to address this question using 118 optical integral field unit datacubes from the Calar Alto Void Integral-field Treasury surveY (CAVITY), observed with the PMAS/PPaK spectrograph at the 3.5m telescope at the Calar Alto Observatory (Almer\'ia, Spain). We used the non-parametric full spectral fitting code STARLIGHT to estimate their stellar population properties: stellar mass, stellar mass surface density, age, star formation rate (SFR), and specific star formation rate (sSFR). We analysed the results through the global and spatially resolved properties. Then, we compared them with a control sample of galaxies in filaments and walls from the CALIFA survey, matched in stellar mass and morphological type. Key findings include void galaxies having a slightly higher half-light radius (HLR), lower stellar mass surface density, and younger ages across all morphological types, and slightly elevated SFR and sSFR (only significant enough for Sas). Many of these differences appear in the outer parts of spiral galaxies in voids (HLR > 1), which are younger and exhibit a higher sSFR, indicative of less evolved discs. This trend is also found for early-type spirals, suggesting a slower transition from star-forming to quiescent states in voids. Our analysis indicates that void galaxies, influenced by their surroundings, undergo a more gradual evolution, especially in their outer regions, with a more pronounced effect for low-mass galaxies., Comment: 24 pages, 22 figures, 5 tables. Accepted for publication in A&A. Updated references list

Star formation quenching is one of the key processes that shape the evolution of galaxies. In this study, we investigate the changes in molecular gas and star formation properties as galaxies transit from the star-forming main sequence to the passive regime. Our analysis reveals that as galaxies move away from the main sequence towards the green valley the radial profile of specific star formation rate surface density ($\Sigma_\mathrm{sSFR}$) is suppressed compared with main sequence galaxies out to a galactocentric radius of 1.5 $R_{e}$ ($\sim$ 7 kpc for our sample). By combining radial profiles of gas fraction ($f_\mathrm{gas}$) and star formation efficiency (SFE), we can discern the underlying mechanism that determines $\Sigma_\mathrm{sSFR}$ at different galactocentric radii. Analysis of relative contributions of $f_\mathrm{gas}$ and SFE to $\Sigma_\mathrm{sSFR}$ uncovers a diverse range of quenching modes. Star formation in approximately half of our quenching galaxies is primarily driven by a single mode (i.e. either $f_\mathrm{gas}$ or SFE), or a combination of both. A collective analysis of all galaxies reveals that the reduction in star formation within the central regions ($R$ $<$ 0.5 $R_{e}$) is primarily attributable to a decrease in SFE. Conversely, in the disk regions ($R$ $>$ 0.5 $R_{e}$), both $f_\mathrm{gas}$ and SFE contribute to the suppression of star formation. Our findings suggest that multiple quenching mechanisms may be at play in our sample galaxies, and even within a single galaxy. We also compare our observational outcomes with those from galaxy simulations and discuss the implications of our data., Comment: 27 pages, 8 figures, 1 table. Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal

Context. One of the most fundamental scaling relations in galaxies is observed between metallicity and stellar mass -- the mass-metallicity relation (MZR) -- although recently a stronger dependence of the gas-phase metallicity with the galactic gravitational potential ($\Phi \rm ZR$) has been reported. Further dependences of metallicity on other galaxy properties have been revealed, with the star formation rate (SFR) being one of the most studied and debated secondary parameters in the relation (the so-called fundamental metallicity relation). Aims. In this work we explore the dependence of the gas-phase metallicity residuals from the MZR and $\Phi \rm ZR$ on different galaxy properties in the search for the most fundamental scaling relation in galaxies. Methods. We applied a random forest regressor algorithm on a sample of 3430 nearby star-forming galaxies from the SDSS-IV MaNGA survey. Using this technique, we explored the effect of 147 additional parameters on the global oxygen abundance residuals obtained after subtracting the MZR. Alternatively, we followed a similar approach with the metallicity residuals from the $\Phi \rm ZR$. Results. The stellar metallicity of the galaxy is revealed as the secondary parameter in both the MZR and the $\Phi \rm ZR$, ahead of the SFR. This parameter reduces the scatter in the relations $\sim 10-15\%$. We find the 3D relation between gravitational potential, gas metallicity, and stellar metallicity to be the most fundamental metallicity relation observed in galaxies., Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in A&A Letters

The EDGE-CALIFA survey provides spatially resolved optical integral field unit (IFU) and CO spectroscopy for 125 galaxies selected from the CALIFA Data Release 3 sample. The Extragalactic Database for Galaxy Evolution (EDGE) presents the spatially resolved products of the survey as pixel tables that reduce the oversampling in the original images and facilitate comparison of pixels from different images. By joining these pixel tables to lower dimensional tables that provide radial profiles, integrated spectra, or global properties, it is possible to investigate the dependence of local conditions on large-scale properties. The database is freely accessible and has been utilized in several publications. We illustrate the use of this database and highlight the effects of CO upper limits on the inferred slopes of the local scaling relations between stellar mass, star formation rate (SFR), and H$_2$ surface densities. We find that the correlation between H$_2$ and SFR surface density is the tightest among the three relations., Comment: 21 pages, accepted for publication in ApJS, see DOIs below for code and data access

We present ALMA observations of two dense gas tracers, HCN(1-0) and HCO$^{+}$(1-0), for three galaxies in the green valley and two galaxies on the star-forming main sequence with comparable molecular gas fractions as traced by the CO(1-0) emissions, selected from the ALMaQUEST survey. We investigate whether the deficit of molecular gas star formation efficiency (SFE$_{\rm mol}$) that leads to the low specific star formation rate in these green valley galaxies is due to a lack of dense gas (characterized by the dense gas fraction $f_{\rm dense}$) or the low star formation efficiency of dense gas (SFE$_{\rm dense}$). We find that SFE$_{\rm mol}$ as traced by the CO emissions, when considering both star-forming and retired spaxels together, is tightly correlated with SFE$_{\rm dense}$ and depends only weakly on $f_{\rm dense}$. The specific star formation rate (sSFR) on kpc scales is primarily driven by SFE$_{\rm mol}$ and SFE$_{\rm dense}$, followed by the dependence on $f_{\rm mol}$, and is least correlated with $f_{\rm dense}$ or the dense-to-stellar mass ratio ($R_{\rm dense}$). When compared with other works in the literature, we find that our green valley sample shows lower global SFE$_{\rm mol}$ as well as lower SFE$_{\rm dense}$ while exhibiting similar dense gas fractions when compared to star-forming and starburst galaxies. We conclude that the star formation of the 3 green valley galaxies with a normal abundance of molecular gas is suppressed mainly due to the reduced SFE$_{\rm dense}$ rather than the lack of dense gas., Comment: 20 pages, 13 figures, ApJ accepted

We report a faint non-axisymmetric structure in NGC\,1087 through the use of JWST Near Infrared Camera { (NIRCam)}, with an associated kinematic counterpart observed as an oval distortion in the stellar velocity map, \ha~and CO~$J=2\rightarrow1$ velocity fields. This structure is not evident in the MUSE optical continuum images but only revealed in the near-IR with the F200W and F300M band filters at $2\mu$m and $3\mu$m respectively. Due to its elongation, this structure resembles a stellar bar although with remarkable differences with respect to conventional stellar bars. Most of the near-IR emission is concentrated within $6\arcsec~\sim500$~pc with a maximum extension up to 1.2~kpc. The spatial extension of the large-scale non-circular motions is coincident with the bar, which undoubtedly confirms the presence of a non-axisymmetric perturbation in the potential of NGC\,1087. The oval distortion is enhanced in CO due to its dynamically cold nature rather than in \ha. We found that the kinematics in all phases including stellar, ionized and molecular, can be described simultaneously by a model containing a bisymmetric perturbation; however, we find that an inflow model of gas along the bar major axis is also likely. Furthermore the molecular mass inflow rate associated can explain the observed star formation rate in the bar. This reinforces the idea that bars are mechanisms for transporting gas and triggering star formation. This work contributes to our understanding of non-axisymmetry in galaxies using the most sophisticated data so far., Comment: 14 pages, 8 Figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

We present a $^{12}$CO($J$=2-1) survey of 60 local galaxies using data from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Compact Array as part of the Extragalactic Database for Galaxy Evolution: the ACA EDGE survey. These galaxies all have integral field spectroscopy from the CALIFA survey. Compared to other local galaxy surveys, ACA EDGE is designed to mitigate selection effects based on CO brightness and morphological type. Of the 60 galaxies in ACA EDGE, 36 are on the star-formation main sequence, 13 are on the red sequence, and 11 lie in the ``green valley" transition between these sequences. We test how star formation quenching processes affect the star formation rate (SFR) per unit molecular gas mass, SFE$_{\rm mol}=$SFR/$M_{\rm mol}$, and related quantities in galaxies with stellar masses $10\leq$log[$M_\star/$M$_\odot$]$\leq11.5$ covering the full range of morphological types. We observe a systematic decrease of the molecular-to-stellar mass fraction ($R^{\rm mol}_{\star}$) with decreasing level of star formation activity, with green valley galaxies having also lower SFE$_{\rm mol}$ than galaxies on the main sequence. On average, we find that the spatially resolved SFE$_{\rm mol}$ within the bulge region of green valley galaxies is lower than in the bulges of main sequence galaxies if we adopt a constant CO-to-H$_2$ conversion factor, $\alpha_{\rm CO}$. While efficiencies in main sequence galaxies remain almost constant with galactocentric radius, in green valley galaxies we note a systematic increase of SFE$_{\rm mol}$, $R^{\rm mol}_{\star}$, and specific star formation rate, sSFR, with increasing radius. Our results suggest that although gas depletion (or removal) seems to be the most important driver of the star-formation quenching in galaxies transiting through the green valley, a reduction in star formation efficiency is also required during this stage.

We present the extended ALMA MaNGA QUEnching and STar formation survey, a combination of the original 46 ALMaQUEST galaxies plus new ALMA observations for a further 20 interacting galaxies. Three well-studied scaling relations are fit to the 19,999 star-forming spaxels in the extended sample, namely the resolved Schmidt-Kennicutt (rSK) relation, the resolved star forming main sequence (rSFMS) and the resolved molecular gas main sequence (rMGMS). We additionally investigate the relationship between the dynamical equilibrium pressure (PDE) and star formation rate surface density (Sigma_SFR), which we refer to as the resolved PDE (rPDE) relation. Contrary to previous studies that have focussed on normal star-forming galaxies and found an approximately linear rPDE relation, the presence of more vigourously star-forming galaxies in the extended ALMaQUEST sample reveals a marked turnover in the relation at high pressures. Although the scatter around the linear fit to the rPDE relation is similar to the other three relations, a random forest analysis, which can extract non-linear dependences, finds that PDE is unambiguously more important than either Sigma_H2 or Sigma_star for predicting Sigma_SFR. We compare the observed rPDE relation to the prediction of the pressure-regulated feedback-modulated (PRFM) model of star formation, finding that galaxies residing on the global SFMS do indeed closely follow the rPDE relation predicted by the PRFM theory. However, galaxies above and below the global SFMS show significant deviations from the model. Galaxies with high SFR are instead consistent with models that include other contributions to turbulence in addition to the local star formation feedback., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS

Interpreting the scaling relations followed by galaxies is a fundamental tool for assessing how well we understand galaxy formation and evolution. Several scaling relations involving the galaxy metallicity have been discovered through the years, the foremost of which is the scaling with stellar mass. This so-called mass-metallicity relation is thought to be fundamental and has been subject to many studies in the literature. We study the dependence of the gas-phase metallicity on many different galaxy properties to assess which of them determines the metallicity of a galaxy. We applied a random forest regressor algorithm on a sample of more than 3000 nearby galaxies from the SDSS-IV MaNGA survey. Using this machine-learning technique, we explored the effect of 148 parameters on the global oxygen abundance as an indicator of the gas metallicity. $M_{\rm \star}$/$R_e$, as a proxy for the baryonic gravitational potential of the galaxy, is found to be the primary factor determining the average gas-phase metallicity of the galaxy ($Z_g$). It outweighs stellar mass. A subsequent analysis provides the strongest dependence of $Z_g$ on $M_\star / R_e^{\,0.6}$. We argue that this parameter traces the total gravitational potential, and the exponent $\alpha\simeq 0.6$ accounts for the inclusion of the dark matter component. Our results reveal the importance of the relation between the total gravitational potential of the galaxy and the gas metallicity. This relation is tighter and likely more primordial than the widely known mass-metallicity relation., Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A

We present results from a systematic search for broad ($\geq$ 400 \kms) \ha\ emission in Integral Field Spectroscopy data cubes of $\sim$1200 nearby galaxies obtained with PMAS and MUSE. We found 19 unique regions that pass our quality cuts, four of which match the locations of previously discovered SNe: one Type IIP, and three Type IIn, including the well-known SN 2005ip. We suggest that these objects are young Supernova Remnants, with bright and broad \ha\ emission powered by the interaction between the SN ejecta and dense circumstellar material. The stellar ages measured at the location of these SNR candidates are systematically lower by about 0.5 dex than those measured at the location of core collapse SNe, implying that their progenitors might be shorter lived and therefore more massive than a typical CC SN progenitor. The methods laid out in this work open a new window into the study of nearby SNe with Integral Field Spectroscopy., Comment: 16 pages, 10 figures, replaced with accepted version on 01/05/2024

The connection between quenching mechanisms, which rapidly turn star-forming systems into quiescent, and the properties of the galaxy population remains difficult to discern. In this work we investigate the physical properties of MaNGA and SAMI galaxies at different stages of their star formation history. Specifically, we compare galaxies with signatures of recent quenching (Quenched) -- $\rm H(\alpha)$ in absorption and low $D_n(4000)$ -- with the rest of the low star-forming and active population (Retired and Ageing, respectively). The analysis is performed in terms of characteristics such as the total stellar mass, half-light radius, velocity-to-dispersion ratio, metallicity, and environment. We find that the Ageing population comprises a heterogeneous mixture of galaxies, preferentially late-type systems, with diverse physical properties. Retired galaxies, formerly Ageing or Quenched systems, are dominated by early-type high-mass galaxies found both at low and dense environments. Most importantly, we find that recently quenched galaxies are consistent with a population of compact low-mass satellite systems, with higher metallicities than their Ageing analogues. We argue that this is compatible with being quenched after undergoing a star-burst phase induced by environmental processes (e.g. ram pressure). However, we also detect a non-negligible fraction of field central galaxies likely quenched by internal processes. This study highlights that, in order to constrain the mechanisms driving galaxy evolution, it is crucial to distinguish between old (Retired) and recently quenched galaxies, thus requiring at least two estimates of the specific star formation rate over different timescales., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS

Core-collapse supernovae (CCSNe) are widely accepted to be caused by the explosive death of massive stars with initial masses $\gtrsim 8$M$_\odot$. There is, however, a comparatively poor understanding of how properties of the progenitors -- mass, metallicity, multiplicity, rotation etc. -- manifest in the resultant CCSN population. Here we present a minimally biased sample of nearby CCSNe from the ASAS-SN survey whose host galaxies were observed with integral-field spectroscopy using MUSE at the VLT. This dataset allows us to analyze the explosion sites of CCSNe within the context of global star formation properties across the host galaxies. We show that the CCSN explosion site oxygen abundance distribution is offset to lower values than the overall HII region abundance distribution within the host galaxies. We further show that within the subsample of low-metallicity host galaxies, the CCSNe unbiasedly trace the star-formation with respect to oxygen abundance, while for the sub-sample of higher-metallicity host galaxies, they preferentially occur in lower-abundance star-forming regions. We estimate the occurrence of CCSNe as a function of oxygen abundance per unit star formation, and show that there is a strong decrease as abundance increases. Such a strong and quantified metallicity dependence on CCSN production has not been shown before. Finally, we discuss possible explanations for our result and show that each of these has strong implications for our understanding of CCSNe and massive star evolution., Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, accepted at ApJL

The analysis of core-collapse supernova (CCSN) environments can provide important information on the life cycle of massive stars and constrain the progenitor properties of these powerful explosions. The MUSE instrument at the VLT enables detailed local environment constraints of the progenitors of large samples of CCSNe. Using a homogeneous SN sample from the ASAS-SN survey has enabled us to perform a minimally biased statistical analysis of CCSN environments. We analyze 111 galaxies observed by MUSE that hosted 112 CCSNe detected or discovered by the ASAS-SN survey between 2014 and 2018. The majority of the galaxies were observed by the the AMUSING survey. Here we analyze the immediate environment around the SN locations and compare the properties between the different CCSN types and their light curves. We used stellar population synthesis and spectral fitting techniques to derive physical parameters for all HII regions detected within each galaxy, including the star formation rate (SFR), H$\alpha$ equivalent width (EW), oxygen abundance, and extinction. We found that stripped-envelope (SE) SNe occur in environments with a higher median SFR, H$\alpha$ EW, and oxygen abundances than SNe II and SNe IIn/Ibn. The distributions of SNe II and IIn are very similar, indicating that these events explode in similar environments. For the SESNe, SNe Ic have higher median SFRs, H$\alpha$ EWs, and oxygen abundances than SNe Ib. SNe IIb have environments with similar SFRs and H$\alpha$ EWs to SNe Ib, and similar oxygen abundances to SNe Ic. We also show that the postmaximum decline rate, $s$, of SNe II correlates with the H$\alpha$ EW, and that the luminosity and the $\Delta m_{15}$ parameter of SESNe correlate with the oxygen abundance, H$\alpha$ EW, and SFR at their environments. This suggests a connection between the explosion mechanisms of these events to their environment properties., Comment: 27 pages, 16 figures, accepted at A&A

Type IIn supernovae occur when stellar explosions are surrounded by dense hydrogen-rich circumstellar matter. The dense circumstellar matter is likely formed by extreme mass loss from their progenitors shortly before they explode. The nature of Type IIn supernova progenitors and the mass-loss mechanism forming the dense circumstellar matter are still unknown. In this work, we investigate if there are any correlations between Type IIn supernova properties and their local environments. We use Type IIn supernovae with well-observed light-curves and host-galaxy integral field spectroscopic data so that we can estimate both supernova and environmental properties. We find that Type IIn supernovae with a higher peak luminosity tend to occur in environments with lower metallicity and/or younger stellar populations. The circumstellar matter density around Type IIn supernovae is not significantly correlated with metallicity, so the mass-loss mechanism forming the dense circumstellar matter around Type IIn supernovae might be insensitive to metallicity., Comment: 15 pages, 8 pages, 4 tables, accepted by Astronomy & Astrophysics

Using the PMAS Integral Field Unit on the Calar Alto 3.5m telescope we observed the southern component (Markarian 59) of the `cometary' starburst galaxy NGC 4861. Mrk 59 is centred on a giant nebula and concentration of stars 1 kpc in diameter. Strong $\rm H\alpha$ emission points to a star-formation rate (SFR) at least 0.47 $\rm M_{\odot}yr^{-1}$. Mrk 59 has a very high [OIII]$\rm\lambda5007/H\beta$ ratio, reaching 7.35 in the central nebula, with a second peak at a star-forming hotspot further north. Fast outflows are not detected but nebular motion and galaxy rotation produce relative velocities up to 40 km $\rm s^{-1}$. Spectral analysis of different regions with `Fitting Analysis using Differential evolution Optimisation' (FADO) finds that the stars in the central and `spur' nebulae are very young, $\rm \leq125~Myr$ with a large $\rm <10~Myr$ contribution. Older stars ($\rm \sim 1~Gyr$) make up the northern disk component, while the other regions show mixtures of 1 Gyr age with very young stars. This and the high specific SFR $\rm\sim 3.5~Gyr^{-1}$ imply a bimodal star formation history, with Mrk 59 formed in ongoing starbursts fuelled by a huge gas inflow, turning the galaxy into an asymmetric `green pea' or blue compact dwarf. We map the HeII$\lambda4686$ emission, and identify a broad component from the central nebula, consistent with the emission of $\sim 300$ Wolf-Rayet stars. About a third of the HeII$\lambda$4686 flux is a narrow line emitted from a more extended area covering the central and spur nebulae, and may have a different origin., Comment: 19 pages, 24 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

A complete demographic of active galactic nuclei (AGN) is essential to understand the evolution of the Universe. Optical surveys estimate the population of AGN in the local Universe to be of $\sim$ 4%. However, these results could be biased towards bright sources, not affected by the host galaxy attenuation. An alternative method for detecting these objects is through the X-ray emission. In this work, we aim to complement the AGN population of the optical CALIFA survey (941 sources), by using X-ray data from Chandra, which provides the best spatial resolution to date, essential to isolate the nuclear emission from the host galaxy. We study a total of 138 sources with available data. We find 34 new bonafide AGN and 23 AGN candidates, which could increase the AGN population to 7-10\% among the CALIFA survey. X-rays are particularly useful for low-luminosity AGN since they are excluded by the criterion of large equivalent width of the $H\alpha$ emission line when applied to optical selections. Indeed, placing such a restrictive criteria might cause a loss of up to 70% of AGN sources. X-ray detected sources are preferentially located in the right side of the [$OIII$]/$H\beta$ versus [$NII$]/$H\alpha$ diagram, suggesting that this diagram might be the most reliable at classifying AGN sources. Our results support the idea that multi-wavelength studies are the best way to obtain a complete AGN population., Comment: 18 pages, 8 figures, 7 tables, 5 pages of supplementary online material available. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

The eighteenth data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Surveys (SDSS) is the first one for SDSS-V, the fifth generation of the survey. SDSS-V comprises three primary scientific programs, or "Mappers": Milky Way Mapper (MWM), Black Hole Mapper (BHM), and Local Volume Mapper (LVM). This data release contains extensive targeting information for the two multi-object spectroscopy programs (MWM and BHM), including input catalogs and selection functions for their numerous scientific objectives. We describe the production of the targeting databases and their calibration- and scientifically-focused components. DR18 also includes ~25,000 new SDSS spectra and supplemental information for X-ray sources identified by eROSITA in its eFEDS field. We present updates to some of the SDSS software pipelines and preview changes anticipated for DR19. We also describe three value-added catalogs (VACs) based on SDSS-IV data that have been published since DR17, and one VAC based on the SDSS-V data in the eFEDS field., Comment: Accepted to ApJS

The gas metallicity distributions across individual galaxies and across galaxy samples can teach us much about how galaxies evolve. Massive galaxies typically possess negative metallicity gradients, and mass and metallicity are tightly correlated on local scales over wide range of galaxy masses; however, the precise origins of such trends remain elusive. Here, we employ data from SDSS-IV MaNGA to explore how gas metallicity depends on local stellar mass density and on galactocentric radius within individual galaxies. We also consider how the strengths of these dependencies vary across the galaxy mass-size plane. We find that radius is more predictive of local metallicity than stellar mass density in extended lower mass galaxies, while we find density and radius to be almost equally predictive in higher-mass and more compact galaxies. Consistent with previous work, we find a mild connection between metallicity gradients and large-scale environment; however, this is insufficient to explain variations in gas metallicity behaviour across the mass-size plane. We argue our results to be consistent with a scenario in which extended galaxies have experienced smooth gas accretion histories, producing negative metallicity gradients over time. We further argue that more compact and more massive systems have experienced increased merging activity that disrupts this process, leading to flatter metallicity gradients and more dominant density-metallicity correlations within individual galaxies., Comment: 15 pages, 16 figures. Accepted by MNRAS

Star-formation is one of the main processes that shape galaxies, defining its stellar population and metallicity production and enrichment. It is nowadays known that this process is ruled by a set of relations that connect three parameters: the molecular gas mass, the stellar mass and the star-formation rate itself. These relations are fulfilled at a wide range of scales in galaxies, from galaxy wide to kpc-scales. At which scales they are broken, and how universal they are (i.e., if they change at different scales or for different galaxy types) it is still an open question. We explore here how those relations compare at different scales using as proxy the new analysis done using Integral Field Spectroscopy data and CO observations data from the EDGE-CALIFA survey and the AMUSSING++ compilation., Comment: 8 pages, 3 figures, 1 table, proceedings of the IAU Symposium 373: Resolving the Rise and Fall of Star Formation in Galaxies

Despite the importance of feedback from active galactic nuclei (AGNs) in models of galaxy evolution, observational constraints on the influence of AGN feedback on star formation remain weak. To this end, we have compared the star formation trends of 279 low-redshift AGN galaxies with 558 inactive control galaxies using integral field unit spectroscopy from the SDSS-IV MaNGA survey. With a Gaussian process-based methodology, we reconstruct nonparametric star formation histories in spatially resolved spaxels covering the face of each galaxy. Based on galaxy-wide star formation rates (SFRs) alone, we find no obvious signatures of AGN feedback. However, the AGN galaxies have significantly suppressed central (kiloparsec-scale) SFRs, lying up to a factor of $2$ below those of the control galaxies, providing direct observational evidence of AGN feedback suppressing star formation. The suppression of central SFRs in the AGN galaxies began in the central regions ${\sim} 6$ Gyr ago (redshift $z {\sim} 0.7$), taking place over a few gigayears. A small subset of the AGN galaxies were rapidly driven to quiescence shortly before being observed (in the last $500$ Myr), potentially indicating instances of AGN-driven feedback. More frequently, however, star formation continues in the AGN galaxies, with suppression primarily in the central regions. This is suggestive of a picture in which integrated (Gyr-timescale) AGN feedback can significantly affect central star formation, but may be inefficient in driving galaxy-wide quenching in low-redshift galaxies, instead leaving them in the green valley., Comment: 22 pages, 15 figures. Accepted for publication in ApJ

Modern astronomical observations give unprecedented access to the physical properties of nearby galaxies, including spatially resolved stellar populations. However, observations can only give a present-day view of the Universe, whereas cosmological simulations give access to the past record of the processes that galaxies have experienced in their evolution. To connect the events that happened in the past with galactic properties as seen today, simulations must be taken to a common ground before being compared to observations. We emulate data from the MaNGA survey, which is the largest integral field spectroscopic galaxy survey to date with its 10,000 nearby galaxies of all types. For this, we use the cosmological simulations TNG50 to generate MaNGIA (Mapping Nearby Galaxies with IllustrisTNG Astrophysics), a mock MaNGA sample of similar size that emulates observations of galaxies for stellar population analysis. We choose TNG galaxies to match the MaNGA sample selection to limit the impact of selection effects. We produce MaNGA-like datacubes from all simulated galaxies, and process these with the pyPipe3D analysis code. This allows us to extract spatially resolved stellar maps. This first paper presents the approach to generate the mock sample and provides an initial exploration of its properties. We show that the stellar populations and kinematics of the simulated MaNGIA galaxies are overall in good agreement with observations. Specific discrepancies, especially in the age and metallicity gradients in low- to intermediate-mass regimes and in massive galaxies' kinematics, require further investigation. We compare our results to other attempts to mock similar observations, all of smaller data sets. Our final dataset will be released with the publication, consisting of >10,000 post-processed data-cubes analysed with pyPipe3D, along with the codes developed to create it., Comment: Submitted to A&A, 21 pages, 17 figures, 1 table

Shocks and torques produced by non-axisymmetric structures such as spiral arms and bars may transport gas to galaxy central regions. We test this hypothesis by studying the dependence of concentration of CO luminosity ($C_{CO}$), molecular gas ($C_{mol}$), and star formation rate ($C_{SFR}$) in central $\sim$ 2 kpc on the $strength$ of non-axisymmetric disk structure using a sample of 57 disk galaxies selected from the EDGE-CALIFA survey. $C_{mol}$ is calculated using a CO-to-H$_2$ conversion factor that decreases with higher metallicity and higher stellar surface density. We find that $C_{mol}$ is systematically 0.22 dex lower than $C_{CO}$. We confirm that high $C_{mol}$ and strong non-axisymmetric disk structure are more common in barred galaxies than in unbarred galaxies. However, we find that spiral arms also increase $C_{mol}$. We show that there is a good correlation between $C_{mol}$ and the $strength$ of non-axisymmetric structure (which can be due to a bar, spiral arms, or both). This suggests that the stronger the bars and spirals, the more efficient the galaxy is at transporting cold gas to its center. Despite the small subsample size, $C_{mol}$ of the four Seyferts are not significantly reduced compared to inactive galaxies of similar disk structure, implying that the AGN feedback in Seyferts may not notably affect the molecular gas distribution in the central $\sim$2kpc. We find that $C_{SFR}$ tightly correlates with $C_{mol}$ in both unbarred and barred galaxies. Likewise, elevated $C_{SFR}$ is found in galaxies with strong disk structure. Our results suggest that the disk structure, either spirals or bars, can transport gas to the central regions, with higher inflow rates corresponding to stronger structure, and consequently boost central star formation. Both spirals and bars play, therefore, an essential role in the secular evolution of disk galaxies., Comment: 24 pages; accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics; typos corrected

We study recent changes on the star formation history (SFH) of galaxies by means of the ageing diagram (AD), tracing the fraction of stars formed during the last $\sim 20$ Myr through the equivalent width of the H$\alpha$ line and $\sim 1-3$ Gyr through the dust-corrected optical colour $(g-r)_0$ or the Balmer break. We provide a physical characterization by using Pipe3D estimates of the SFH of CALIFA and MaNGA galaxies, in combination with the predictions from IllustrisTNG-100. Our results show that the AD may be divided into four domains that correlate with the stellar mass fractions formed in the last 20 Myr and 3 Gyr: Ageing systems, whose SFR changes on scales of several Gyr, account for $70-80\%$ of the galaxy population. Objects whose SFH was abruptly truncated in the last $\sim 1$ Gyr arrange along a detached Quenched sequence that represents $\sim 5-10\%$ by (volume-corrected) number for $10^9 < M_*/{\rm M_\odot} < 10^{12}$. Undetermined systems represent an intermediate population between the Ageing and Quenched regimes. Finally, Retired galaxies, dominated by old stellar populations, are located at the region in the AD where the Ageing and Quenched sequences converge. Defining different star formation activity levels in terms of the birth rate parameter $b\equiv \frac{SFR}{\langle SFR \rangle}$, we find that galaxies transit from the Ageing to Quenched sequences on scales $\sim 500$ Myr. We conclude that the ageing diagram provides a useful tool to discern recently Quenched galaxies from the dominant Ageing population., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS

We present MUSE integral field stellar and ionized velocity maps for a sample of 14 barred galaxies. Most of these objects exhibit "S"-shape iso-velocities in the bar region indicative of the presence of streaming motions in the velocity fields. % By applying circular rotation models we observe that bars leave symmetric structures in the residual maps of the stellar velocity. %which demonstrates the capabilities of the MUSE instrument for detecting kinematic bar signatures. % We built non-circular rotation models using the \xs~tool to characterize the observed velocity fields. In particular we adopt bisymmetric models and a harmonic decomposition for a bar potential for describing the non-axisymmetric velocities. We find that both models reproduce the observed kinematic features. % The position angle of the oval distortion estimated from the bisymmetric model correlates with the photometric bar position angle $(\rho_{pearson} = 0.95)$, which suggest that non-circular velocities are caused by the bar. However because of the low amplitudes of the $s_3$ harmonic we can not rule out radial flows as possible source. % Because of the weak detection of \ha~in our objects we are not able to compare gas to stellar non-circular motions in our sample, although we show that when galaxies are gas rich the oval distortion is also observed but with larger amplitudes. % Finally, we do not find evidence that the amplitude of the non-circular motions is dependent on the bar size, stellar mass or the global SFR., Comment: 17 pages, 11 Figures, submitted to ApJ

We present a spectroscopic analysis of 44 low-luminosity host galaxies of Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) detected by the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae (ASAS-SN), using the emission lines to measure metallicities and star formation rates. We find that although the star formation activity of our sample is representative of general galaxies, there is some evidence that the lowest-mass SN Ia host galaxies (log($M_\star/M_\odot$)$<8$) in our sample have high metallicities compared to general galaxies of similar masses. We also identify a subset of 5 galaxies with particularly high metallicities. This highlights the need for spectroscopic analysis of more low-luminosity, low-mass SN Ia host galaxies to test the robustness of these conclusions and their potential impact on our understanding of SN Ia progenitors., Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables. Submitted to ApJ. Full versions of the tables in the paper are available in machine-readable format as ancillary files

We analyse the spatial statistics of the 2D gas-phase oxygen abundance distributions in a sample of 219 local galaxies. We introduce a new adaptive binning technique to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio of weak lines, which we use to produce well-filled metallicity maps for these galaxies. We show that the two-point correlation functions computed from the metallicity distributions after removing radial gradients are in most cases well described by a simple injection-diffusion model. Fitting the data to this model yields the correlation length $l_{\rm corr}$, which describes the characteristic interstellar medium mixing length scale. We find typical correlation lengths $l_{\rm corr} \sim 1$ kpc, with a strong correlation between $l_{\rm corr}$ and stellar mass, star formation rate, and effective radius, a weak correlation with Hubble type, and significantly elevated values of $l_{\rm corr}$ in interacting or merging galaxies. We show that the trend with star formation rate can be reproduced by a simple transport+feedback model of interstellar medium turbulence at high star formation rate, and plausibly also at low star formation rate if dwarf galaxy winds have large mass-loading factors. We also report the first measurements of the injection width that describes the initial radii over which supernova remnants deposit metals. Inside this radius the metallicity correlation function is not purely the product of a competition between injection and diffusion. We show that this size scale is generally smaller than 60 pc., Comment: 18 pages, 18 figures, 1 table, submitted to MNRAS. Comments are welcome

We compare the CO(1-0) and H$\alpha$ kinematics in 34 nearby galaxies, selected from the ALMaQUEST and EDGE-CALIFA surveys. We use 3-D Barolo, a 3D tilted ring model, to derive the CO and H$\alpha$ rotation curves. Before comparing rotation curves in the 34 nearby galaxies, we found systematics between the MaNGA and the CALIFA data using eight MaNGA-CALIFA overlapping galaxies. We assume the rotation curves based on the MaNGA data are accurate and made the corresponding correction to the CALIFA data. Our result shows that $\sim$56% (19/34) of our galaxies present slower H$\alpha$ rotation curves compared to the CO rotation curves, with a median value of 6.5 km/s. The remaining galaxies (15/34) show consistent CO-H$\alpha$ rotation velocity within uncertainties. As a result, the Ha rotation may underestimate the total dynamical mass by ~6% for a circular velocity of 200 km/s (the median value in our sample). Furthermore, the velocity difference between the CO and H$\alpha$ rotation velocity is found to correlate with the velocity dispersion difference between CO and H$\alpha$, suggesting that the gas pressure plays a role in the velocity discrepancy. After incorporating the effect of pressure support due to the turbulent gas motion to our sample, the median value of the velocity differences decreases to 1.9 km/s, which in turn reduces the underestimation of dynamical mass to $\sim$2%. Finally, we also investigate the role that the extra-planar diffuse ionized gas (eDIG) plays in the CO-H$\alpha$ velocity discrepancy.

We analyze spatially resolved and co-added SDSS-IV MaNGA spectra with signal-to-noise ~100 from 2200 passive central galaxies (z~0.05) to understand how central galaxy assembly depends on stellar mass (M*) and halo mass (Mh). We control for systematic errors in Mh by employing a new group catalog from Tinker (2020a,b) and the widely-used Yang et al. (2007) catalog. At fixed M*, the strength of several stellar absorption features varies systematically with Mh. Completely model-free, this is one of the first indications that the stellar populations of centrals with identical M* are affected by the properties of their host halos. To interpret these variations, we applied full spectral fitting with the code alf. At fixed M*, centrals in more massive halos are older, show lower [Fe/H], and have higher [Mg/Fe] with 3.5 sigma confidence. We conclude that halos not only dictate how much M* galaxies assemble, but also modulate their chemical enrichment histories. Turning to our analysis at fixed Mh, high-M* centrals are older, show lower [Fe/H], and have higher [Mg/Fe] for Mh>10^{12}Msun/h with confidence > 4 sigma. While massive passive galaxies are thought to form early and rapidly, our results are among the first to distinguish these trends at fixed Mh. They suggest that high-M* centrals experienced unique early formation histories, either through enhanced collapse and gas fueling, or because their halos were early-forming and highly concentrated, a possible signal of galaxy assembly bias., Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ. 28 pages and 12 figures

Gas-phase metallicity gradients in galaxies provide important clues to those galaxies' formation histories. Using SDSS-IV MaNGA data, we previously demonstrated that gas metallicity gradients vary systematically and significantly across the galaxy mass--size plane: at stellar masses beyond approximately $10^{10}$ $\mathrm{M_\odot}$, more extended galaxies display steeper gradients (in units of $\mathrm{dex/R_e}$) at a given stellar mass. Here, we set out to develop a physical interpretation of these findings by examining the ability of local $\sim$kpc-scale relations to predict the gradient behaviour along the mass--size plane. We find that local stellar mass surface density, when combined with total stellar mass, is sufficient to reproduce the overall mass--size trend in a qualitative sense. We further find that we can improve the predictions by correcting for residual trends relating to the recent star formation histories of star-forming regions. However, we find as well that the most extended galaxies display steeper average gradients than predicted, even after correcting for residual metallicity trends with other local parameters. From these results, we argue that gas-phase metallicity gradients can largely be understood in terms of known local relations, but we also discuss some possible physical causes of discrepant gradients., Comment: 21 pages, 23 figures. Accepted by MNRAS; some minor corrections made following receipt of journal proofs

We introduce a novel non-parametric method to find solar neighborhood analogs (SNAs) in extragalactic IFS surveys. The main ansatz is that the physical properties of the solar neighborhood (SN) should be encoded in its optical stellar spectrum. We assume that our best estimate of such spectrum is the one extracted from the analysis performed by the Code for Stellar properties Heuristic Assignment (\textsc{CoSHA}) from the MaStar stellar library. It follows that finding SNAs in other galaxies consist in matching, in a $\chi^2$ sense, the SN reference spectrum across the optical extent of the observed galaxies. We apply this procedure to a selection of CALIFA galaxies, by requiring a close to face-on projection, relative isolation and non-AGN. We explore how the local and global properties of the SNAs (stellar age, metallicity, dust extinction, mass-to-light ratio, stellar surface mass and star-formation densities and galactocentric distance) and their corresponding host galaxies (morphological type, total stellar mass, star-formation rate, effective radius) compare with those of the SN and the Milky Way (MW). We find that SNAs are located preferentially in S(B)a~--~S(B)c galaxies, in a ring-like structure, which radii seems to scale with the galaxy size. Despite the known sources of systematics and errors, {most} properties present a considerable agreement with the literature on the SN. We conclude that the solar neighborhood is relatively common in our sample of SNAs. Our results warrants a systematic exploration of correlations among the physical properties of the SNAs and their host galaxies. We reckon that our method should inform current models of the galactic habitable zone in our MW and other galaxies., Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, Accepted for publication in A&A

We present, for the first time, the relationship between local stellar mass surface density, $\mathrm{\Sigma_{*}}$, and N/O derived from SDSS-IV MaNGA data, using a sample of $792765$ high signal-to-noise ratio star-forming spaxels. Using a combination of phenomenological modelling and partial correlation analysis, we find that $\mathrm{\Sigma_{*}}$ alone is insufficient to predict the N/O in MaNGA spaxels, and that there is an additional dependence on the local star formation rate surface density, $\mathrm{\Sigma_{SFR}}$. This effect is a factor of $3$ stronger than the dependence of 12+log(O/H) on $\mathrm{\Sigma_{SFR}}$. Surprisingly, we find that the local N/O scaling relations also depend on the total galaxy stellar mass at fixed $\Sigma_{*}$ as well as the galaxy size at fixed stellar mass. We find that more compact galaxies are more nitrogen rich, even when $\mathrm{\Sigma_{*}}$ and $\mathrm{\Sigma_{SFR}}$ are controlled for. We show that $\sim50\%$ of the variance of N/O is explained by the total stellar mass and size. Thus, the evolution of nitrogen in galaxies is set by more than just local effects and does not simply track the build up of oxygen in galaxies. The precise form of the N/O-O/H relation is therefore sensitive to the sample of galaxies from which it is derived. This result casts doubt on the universal applicability of nitrogen-based strong-line metallicity indicators derived in the local universe., Comment: 22 pages, 14 figures. Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal

We show the results of a study using the spectral synthesis technique study for the full MaNGA sample showing their Chemical Enrichment History (ChEH) as well as the evolution of the stellar mass-metallicity relation (MZR) over cosmic time. We find that the more massive galaxies became enriched first and the lower mass galaxies did so later, producing a change in the MZR which becomes shallower in time. Separating the sample into morphology and star-forming status bins some particularly interesting results appear: The mass dependency of the MZR becomes less relevant for later morphological types, to the extent that it inverts for Sd/Irr galaxies, suggesting that morphology is at least as important a factor as mass in chemical evolution. The MZR for the full sample shows a flattening at the high-mass end and another at the low-mass range, but the former only appears for retired galaxies while the latter only appears for star-forming galaxies. We also find that the average metallicity gradient is currently negative for all mass bins but for low mass galaxies it was inverted at some point in the past, before which all galaxies had a positive gradient. We also compare how diverse the ChEHs are in the different bins considered as well as what primarily drives the diversity: How much galaxies become enriched or how quickly they do so., Comment: Currently in review at ApJ

According to theory, the torus of active galactic nuclei (AGN) is sustained from a wind coming off the accretion disk, and for low efficient AGN, it has been proposed that such structure disappears. However, the exact conditions for its disappearance remain unclear. This can be studied throughout the reflection component at X-rays, which is associated with distant and neutral material at the inner walls of the torus in obscured AGN. We select a sample of 81 AGNs observed with NuSTAR with a distance limit of D< 200\,Mpc and Eddington rate $\rm{\lambda_{Edd} \equiv L_{bol}/L_{Edd}<10^{-3}}$. We fit the 3-70\,keV spectra using a model accounting for a partial-covering absorber plus a reflection component from neutral material. We find that the existence of the reflection component spans in a wide range of black-hole mass and bolometric luminosities, with only $\sim$13\% of our sample (11 sources) lacking of any reflection signatures. These sources fall in the region in which the torus may be lacking in the L-MBH diagram. For the sources with a detected reflection component, we find that the vast majority of them are highly obscured ($\rm{\log \ N_H > 23}$), with $\rm{\sim 20\%}$ being Compton-thick. We also find an increase on the number of unobscured sources and a tentative increase on the ratio between $\rm{FeK\alpha}$ emission line and Compton-hump luminosities toward $\rm{\lambda_{Edd}=10^{-5}}$, suggesting that the contribution of the $\rm{FeK\alpha}$ line changes with Eddington ratio., Comment: 17 pages, 12 figures, 5 tables. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

This paper documents the seventeenth data release (DR17) from the Sloan Digital Sky Surveys; the fifth and final release from the fourth phase (SDSS-IV). DR17 contains the complete release of the Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA) survey, which reached its goal of surveying over 10,000 nearby galaxies. The complete release of the MaNGA Stellar Library (MaStar) accompanies this data, providing observations of almost 30,000 stars through the MaNGA instrument during bright time. DR17 also contains the complete release of the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment 2 (APOGEE-2) survey which publicly releases infra-red spectra of over 650,000 stars. The main sample from the Extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (eBOSS), as well as the sub-survey Time Domain Spectroscopic Survey (TDSS) data were fully released in DR16. New single-fiber optical spectroscopy released in DR17 is from the SPectroscipic IDentification of ERosita Survey (SPIDERS) sub-survey and the eBOSS-RM program. Along with the primary data sets, DR17 includes 25 new or updated Value Added Catalogs (VACs). This paper concludes the release of SDSS-IV survey data. SDSS continues into its fifth phase with observations already underway for the Milky Way Mapper (MWM), Local Volume Mapper (LVM) and Black Hole Mapper (BHM) surveys., Comment: 40 pages, 8 figures, 6 tables. In press at ApJSS (arxiv v2 corrects some minor typos and updates references)

We present $\texttt{XookSuut}$, a Python implementation of the $\texttt{DiskFit}$ algorithm, optimized to perform robust Bayesian inference on parameters describing models of circular and noncircular rotation in galaxies. $\texttt{XookSuut}$~surges as a Bayesian alternative for kinematic modeling of 2D velocity maps; it implements efficient sampling methods, specifically Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) and Nested Sampling (NS), to obtain the posteriors and marginalized distributions of kinematic models including circular motions, axisymmetric radial flows, bisymmetric flows, and harmonic decomposition of the LoS~velocity. In this way, kinematic models are obtained by pure sampling methods, rather than standard minimization techniques based on the $\chi^2$. All together, $\texttt{XookSuut}$~represents a sophisticated tool for deriving rotational curves and to explore the error distribution and covariance between parameters., Comment: Accepted for publication in RevMxAA, 8 figures, 34 pages

We introduce \cosha{}: a Code for Stellar properties Heuristic Assignment. In order to estimate the stellar properties, \cosha{} implements a Gradient Tree Boosting algorithm to label each star across the parameter space ($T_\mathrm{eff}$, $\log{g}$, $[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]$, and $[\alpha/\mathrm{Fe}]$). We use \cosha{} to estimate these stellar atmospheric parameters of $22\,$k unique stars in the MaNGA Stellar Library (MaStar). To quantify the reliability of our approach, we run both internal tests using the G\"ottingen Stellar Library (GSL, a theoretical library) and the first data release of MaStar, and external tests by comparing the resulting distributions in the parameter space with the APOGEE estimates of the same properties. In summary, our parameter estimates span in the ranges: $T_\mathrm{eff}=[2900,12000]\,$K, $\log{g}=[-0.5,5.6]$, $[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=[-3.74,0.81]$, $[\alpha/\mathrm{Fe}]=[-0.22,1.17]$. {We report internal (external) uncertainties of the properties of $\sigma_{T_\mathrm{eff}}\sim43\,(240)\,$K, $\sigma_{\log{g}}\sim0.2\,(0.4)$, $\sigma_{[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]}\sim0.16\,(0.24)$, $\sigma_{[\alpha/\mathrm{Fe}]}\sim0.09\,(0.08)$.} These uncertainties are comparable to those of other methods with similar objectives. Despite the fact that \cosha{} is not aware of the spatial distribution of these physical properties in the Milky Way, we are able to recover the main trends known in the literature. The catalog of physical properties for MaStar can be accessed in \url{http://ifs.astroscu.unam.mx/MaStar}., Comment: 25 pages, 12 figures, published in ApJS

Feedback from an active galactic nucleus (AGN) is often implicated as a mechanism that leads to the quenching of galactic star formation. However, AGN-driven quenching is challenging to reconcile with observations that AGN hosts tend to harbour equal (or even excess) amounts of gas compared with inactive galaxies of similar stellar mass. In this paper, we investigate whether AGN feedback happens on sub-galactic (kpc) scales, an effect that might be difficult to detect with global gas measurements. Using kpc-scale measurements of molecular gas (Sigma_H2) and stellar mass (Sigma_*) surface densities taken from the EDGE-CALIFA survey, we show that the gas fractions of central AGN regions are typically a factor of ~2 lower than in star-forming regions. Based on four galaxies with the best spaxel statistics, the difference between AGN and star-forming gas fractions is seen even within a given galaxy, indicating that AGN feedback is able to deplete the molecular gas reservoir in the central few kpc., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS Letters

In this paper we analyse the statistics of the 2D gas-phase oxygen abundance distributions of 100 nearby galaxies drawn from the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field spectroscopy Area survey. After removing the large-scale radial metallicity gradient, we compute the two-point correlation functions of the resulting metallicity fluctuation maps. We detect correlations in the majority of our targets, which we show are significantly in excess of what is expected due to beam-smearing, and are robust against the choice of metallicity diagnostic. We show that the correlation functions are generally well-fit by the predictions of a simple model for stochastic metal injection coupled with diffusion, and from the model we show that, after accounting for the effects of both beam smearing and noise, the galaxies in our sample have characteristic correlation lengths of $\sim1$ kpc. Correlation lengths increase with both stellar mass and star formation rate, but show no significant variation with Hubble type, barredness, or merging state. We also find no evidence for a theoretically-predicted relationship between gas velocity dispersion and correlation length, though this may be due to the small dynamic range in gas velocity dispersion across our sample. Our results suggest that measurements of 2D metallicity correlation functions can be a powerful tool for studying galaxy evolution., Comment: 17 pages, 16 figures, 1 table, accepted for publication in MNRAS

As available data sets grow in size and complexity, advanced visualization tools enabling their exploration and analysis become more important. In modern astronomy, integral field spectroscopic galaxy surveys are a clear example of increasing dimensionality and complexity of datasets, which challenge the traditional methods used to extract the physical information they contain. We present the use of a novel self-supervised Machine Learning method to visualize the multi-dimensional information on stellar population and kinematics in the MaNGA survey in a two dimensional plane. Our framework is insensitive to non-physical properties such as the size of integral field unit (IFU) and is therefore able to order galaxies according to their resolved physical properties. Using the extracted representations, we study how galaxies distribute based on their resolved and global physical properties. We show that even when using exclusively information about the internal structure, galaxies naturally cluster into two well-known categories from a purely data driven perspective: rotating main-sequence disks and massive slow rotators, hence confirming distinct assembly channels. Low-mass rotation-dominated quenched galaxies appear only as a third cluster if information about the integrated physical properties is preserved, suggesting a mixture of assembly processes for these galaxies without any particular signature in their internal kinematics that distinguishes them from the two main groups. The framework for data exploration is publicly released with this publication, ready to be used with the MaNGA or other integral field data sets., Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures. Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal

MUSE-based emission-line maps of the spiral galaxy NGC 4030 reveal the existence of unresolved sources with forbidden line emission enhanced with respect to those seen in its own HII regions. This study reports our efforts to detect and isolate these objects and identify their nature. Candidates are first detected as unresolved sources on an image of the second principal component of the Hb, [OIII]5007, Ha, [NII]6584, [SII]6716, 6731 emission-line data cube, where they stand out clearly against both the dominant HII region population and the widespread diffuse emission. The intrinsic emission is then extracted accounting for the highly inhomogeneous emission-line "background" throughout the field of view. Collisional to recombination line ratios like [SII]/Ha, [NII]/Ha, and [OI]/Ha tend to increase when the background emission is corrected for. We find that many (but not all) sources detected with the principal component analysis have properties compatible with supernova remnants (SNRs). Applying a combined [SII]/Ha and [NII]/Ha classification criterion leads to a list of 59 sources with SNR-like emission lines. Many of them exhibit conspicuous spectral signatures of SNRs around 7300 Angs, and a stacking analysis shows that these features are also present, except weaker, in other cases. At nearly 30 Mpc, these are the most distant SNRs detected by optical means to date. We further report the serendipitous discovery of a luminous (M_V ~ -12.5), blue, and variable source, possibly associated with a supernova impostor., Comment: MNRAS, in press

Constraining the delay-time distribution (DTD) of different supernova (SN) types can shed light on the timescales of galaxy chemical enrichment and feedback processes affecting galaxy dynamics, and SN progenitor properties. Here, we present an approach to recover SN DTDs based on integral field spectroscopy (IFS) of their host galaxies. Using a statistical analysis of a sample of 116 supernovae in 102 galaxies, we evaluate different DTD models for SN types Ia (73), II (28) and Ib/c (15). We find the best SN Ia DTD fit to be a power law with an exponent $\alpha = -1.1\pm 0.3$ (50\% confidence interval), and a time delay (between star formation and the first SNe) $\Delta = 50^{+100}_{-35}~Myr$ (50\% C.I.). For core collapse (CC) SNe, both of the Zapartas et al. (2017) DTD models for single and binary stellar evolution are consistent with our results. For SNe II and Ib/c, we find a correlation with a Gaussian DTD model with $\sigma = 82^{+129}_{-23}~Myr$ and $\sigma = 56^{+141}_{-9}~Myr$ (50\% C.I.) respectively. This analysis demonstrates that integral field spectroscopy opens a new way of studying SN DTD models in the local universe.

In order to investigate the role of gas in the demise of star formation on kpc-scales, we compare the resolved molecular gas main sequence (rMGMS: Sigma_* vs Sigma_H2) of star-forming regions to the sequence of `retired' regions that have ceased to form new stars. Using data from the ALMaQUEST survey, we find that retired spaxels form a rMGMS that is distinct from that of star-forming spaxels, offset to lower Sigma_H2 at fixed Sigma_* by a factor of ~5. We study the rMGMS of star-forming and retired spaxels on a galaxy-by-galaxy basis for eight individual ALMaQUEST galaxies. Six of these galaxies have their retired spaxels concentrated within the central few kpc. Molecular gas is detected in 40-100% of retired spaxels in the eight galaxies in our sample. Both the star-forming and retired rMGMS show a diversity in normalization from galaxy-to-galaxy. However, in any given galaxy, the rMGMS for retired regions is found to be distinct from the star-forming sequence and gas fractions of retired spaxels are up to an order of magnitude lower than the star-forming spaxels. We conclude that quenching is associated with a depletion (but not absence) of molecular gas via a mechanism that typically begins in the centre of the galaxy., Comment: MNRAS, in press

Using a sample of ~15,000 kpc-scale star-forming spaxels in 28 galaxies drawn from the ALMA-MaNGA QUEnching and STar formation (ALMaQUEST) survey, we investigate the galaxy-to-galaxy variation of the `resolved' Schmidt-Kennicutt relation (rSK; Sigma_H2 - Sigma_SFR), the `resolved' star forming main sequence (rSFMS; Sigma_* - Sigma_SFR) and the `resolved' molecular gas main sequence (rMGMS; Sigma_* - Sigma_H2). The rSK relation, rSFMS and rMGMS all show significant galaxy-to-galaxy variation in both shape and normalization, indicating that none of these relations is universal between galaxies. The rSFMS shows the largest galaxy-to-galaxy variation and the rMGMS the least. By defining an `offset' from the average relations, we compute a Delta_rSK, Delta_rSFMS, Delta_rMGMS for each galaxy, to investigate correlations with global properties. We find the following correlations with at least 2 sigma significance: the rSK is lower (i.e. lower star formation efficiency) in galaxies with higher M_*, larger Sersic index and lower specific SFR (sSFR); the rSFMS is lower (i.e. lower sSFR) in galaxies with higher M_* and larger Sersic index; the rMGMS is lower (i.e. lower gas fraction) in galaxies with lower sSFR. In the ensemble of all 15,000 data points, the rSK relation and rMGMS show equally tight scatters and strong correlation coefficients, compared with a larger scatter and weaker correlation in the rSFMS. Moreover, whilst there is no correlation between Delta_rSK and Delta_rMGMS in the sample, the offset of a galaxy's rSFMS does correlate with both of the other two offsets. Our results therefore indicate that the rSK and rMGMS are independent relations, whereas the rSFMS is a result of their combination., Comment: MNRAS, in press

Gas-phase abundances and abundance gradients provide much information on past stellar generations, and are powerful probes of how galaxies evolve. Gas abundance gradients in galaxies have been studied as functions of galaxies' mass and size individually, but have largely not been considered across the galaxy mass--size plane. Thus, we investigate gas-phase abundance gradients across this plane, using a sample of over 1000 galaxies selected from the MApping Nearby Galaxies at APO (MaNGA) spectroscopic survey. We find that gradients vary systematically such that above $10^{10}M_{\odot}$, smaller galaxies display flatter gradients than larger galaxies at a given stellar mass. This mass--size behaviour cannot be explained by instrumental effects, nor is it simply a reflection of known trends between gradients and morphology. We explore multiple possibilities for a physical origin for this pattern, though further work is needed to establish a firm physical interpretation., Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures. Accepted by MNRAS

The ALMaQUEST (ALMA-MaNGA QUEnching and STar formation) survey is a program with spatially-resolved $^{12}$CO(1-0) measurements obtained with the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) for 46 galaxies selected from the Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA) DR15 optical integral-field spectroscopic survey. The aim of the ALMaQUEST survey is to investigate the dependence of star formation activity on the cold molecular gas content at kpc scales in nearby galaxies. The sample consists of galaxies spanning a wide range in specific star formation rate (sSFR), including starburst (SB), main-sequence (MS), and green valley (GV) galaxies. In this paper, we present the sample selection and characteristics of the ALMA observations, and showcase some of the key results enabled by the combination of spatially-matched stellar populations and gas measurements. Considering the global (aperture-matched) stellar mass, molecular gas mass, and star formation rate of the sample, we find that the sSFR depends on both the star formation efficiency (SFE) and the molecular gas fraction ($f_{\rm H_{2}}$), although the correlation with the latter is slightly weaker. Furthermore, the dependence of sSFR on the molecular gas content (SFE or $f_{\rm H_{2}}$) is stronger than that on either the atomic gas fraction or the molecular-to-atomic gas fraction, albeit with the small HI sample size. On kpc scales, the variations in both SFE and $f_{\rm H_{2}}$ within individual galaxies can be as large as 1-2 dex thereby demonstrating that the availability of spatially-resolved observations is essential to understand the details of both star formation and quenching processes., Comment: 20 pages. ApJS accepted. Complete figure sets of Figures 7 & 8 are available in the online journal

The search for new global scaling relations linking physical properties of galaxies has a fundamental interest. Furthermore, their recovery from spatially resolved relations has been one of the spotlights of integral field spectroscopy (IFS). In this study we investigate the existence of global and local relations between stellar age ($Age_\star$) and gas-phase metallicity ($Z_g$). To this aim, we analyze IFS data for a sample of 736 star-forming disk galaxies from the MaNGA survey. We report a positive correlation between the global $Z_g$ and $D(4000)$ (an indicator of stellar age), with a slope that decreases with increasing galaxy mass. Locally, a similar trend is found when analyzing the $Z_g$ and $D(4000)$ of the star-forming regions, as well as the residuals resulting from removing the radial gradients of both parameters. The local laws have systematically smaller slopes than the global one. We ascribe this difference to random errors, that make the true slope of the $Age_\star-Z_g$ relation to be systematically underestimated when performing a least square fitting. The explored relation is intimately linked with the already known relation between gas metallicity and star formation rate at fixed mass, both presenting a common physical origin., Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in ApJ

Galaxies in dense environments, such as groups and clusters, experience various processes by which galaxies gain and lose gas. Using data from the SDSS-IV MaNGA survey, we previously reported the discovery of a giant (6 -- 8 kpc in diameter) H$\alpha$ blob, Totoro, about 8 kpc away from a pair of galaxies (Satsuki and Mei) residing in a galaxy group which is experiencing a group-group merger. Here, we combine interferometric $^{12}$CO(1--0) molecular gas data, new wide-field H$\alpha$, $u$-band data, and published X-ray data to determine the origin of the blob. Several scenarios are discussed to account for its multi-wavelength properties, including (1) H$\alpha$ gas being stripped from galaxy Satsuki by ram-pressure; (2) a separated low-surface-brightness galaxy; (3) gas being ejected or ionized by an active galactic nucleus (AGN); and (4) a cooling intra-group medium (IGM). Scenarios (1) and (2) are less favored by the present data. Scenario (3) is also less likely as there is no evidence for an active ongoing AGN in the host galaxy. We find that the CO (cold) and H$\alpha$ (warm) gas coexist with X-ray (hot) structures; moreover, the derived cooling time is within the regime where molecular and H$\alpha$ gas are expected. The coexistence of gas with different temperatures also agrees with that of cooling gas in other systems. Our multi-wavelength results strongly suggest that the CO and H$\alpha$ gas are the product of cooling from the IGM at its current location, i.e., cooling has occurred, and may be ongoing, well outside the host-galaxy core., Comment: 23 pages, 10 figures, Accepted for publication in ApJ