Galaxy formation and evolution
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Cambridge
Department Name: Institute of Astronomy
Abstract
This programmatic five-year rolling grant application addresses one of the most important problems in extragalactic astronomy, the formation and evolution of galaxies, one of the ``big questions'' in the current PPARC Road Map, and is a defining objective of virtually every national decadal survey of astronomy. A full understanding of galaxy formation and evolution requires multiple lines of attack. Observations of the resolved stellar populations in the Milky Way and its Local Group companions provide a detailed fossil record of the dynamical assemblies of the galaxies, the formation of stars, and the buildup of heavy elements over a wide range of mass scales and initial conditions. At the other end of the scale, observations of distant galaxies spanning lookback times of up to 12 Gyr provide direct measurements of the evolution of galaxy populations and the buildup of stars and metals with cosmic time. Finally, measurements of the large-scale star formation and abundance properties of nearby galaxies form a vital astrophysical bridge between the studies of nearby resolved stellar populations and the distant high-redshift investigations, by allowing us to characterise the evolutionary properties of the Hubble sequence and the complex ``gastrophysical'' processes that regulate the accretion of gas and the formation of stars in galaxies. In this rolling grant application we propose a series of investigations that will advance our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution on all three fronts.
Organisations
Publications
Lawrence A
(2007)
The UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey (UKIDSS)
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Verrier P
(2007)
Planetary stability zones in hierarchical triple star systems
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Aretxaga I
(2007)
The SCUBA Half Degree Extragalactic Survey - IV. Radio-mm-FIR photometric redshifts
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Bunker A.
(2007)
Galaxies at high redshift and reionization
in NUOVO CIMENTO DELLA SOCIETA ITALIANA DI FISICA B-BASIC TOPICS IN PHYSICS
Law D
(2007)
Integral Field Spectroscopy of High-Redshift Star-forming Galaxies with Laser-guided Adaptive Optics: Evidence for Dispersion-dominated Kinematics
in The Astrophysical Journal
Smith M
(2007)
The RAVE survey: constraining the local Galactic escape speed
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Adelman-McCarthy J
(2008)
The Sixth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series
Caccianiga A.
(2008)
The
XMM-
Newton bright serendipitous survey -: Identification and optical spectral properties
in ASTRONOMY & ASTROPHYSICS
Pettini M
(2008)
Deuterium abundance in the most metal-poor damped Lyman alpha system: converging on O b,0 h 2
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Walker M
(2008)
Systemic Proper Motions of Milky Way Satellites from Stellar Redshifts: The Carina, Fornax, Sculptor, and Sextans Dwarf Spheroidals
in The Astrophysical Journal