Far-infrared emission and star formation in spiral galaxies
G. Trinchieri, G. Fabbiano, R. Bandiera;
ApJ, 1989, 342, 759
ABSTRACT:The correlations between the emission in the far-IR, H-alpha, and blue in a sample of normal spiral galaxies are investigated.
It is found that
the luminosities in these three bands are all tightly correlated,
although both the strength of the correlations and their functional
dependencies are a function of the galaxies' morphological types.
The best-fit
power laws to these correlations are different for the comparison of
different quantities and deviate significantly from linearity in some cases,
implying the presence of additional emission mechanisms not related to the
general increase of luminosity with galactic mass.
Clear evidence is found of
two independent effects in the incidence of warm far-IR emission in
late-type spirals.
One is a luminosity effect shown by the presence of excess
far-IR relative to H-alpha or optical emission in the more luminous
galaxies.
The other is a dependence on widespread star-formation activity.
KEYWORDS: astronomical photometry, emission spectra, far infrared radiation, spiral galaxies, star formation, h alpha line, interstellar matter, luminosity
CODE: trinchieri89