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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.

Publications

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Seabroke G (2008) Is the sky falling? Searching for stellar streams in the local Milky Way disc in the CORAVEL and RAVE surveys in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Verrier P (2008) HD 98800: a most unusual debris disc in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Maschietto F (2008) [O iii] emitters in the field of the MRC 0316-257 protocluster in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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De Jong J (2008) NUMERICAL COLOR-MAGNITUDE DIAGRAM ANALYSIS OF SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY DATA AND APPLICATION TO THE NEW MILKY WAY SATELLITES in The Astronomical Journal

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Swinbank A (2008) The properties of submm galaxies in hierarchical models in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Chapman S (2008) Interferometric CO Observations of Submillimeter-faint, Radio-selected Starburst Galaxies at z ~ 2 in The Astrophysical Journal

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Dye S (2008) The SCUBA HAlf Degree Extragalactic Survey (SHADES) - VII. Optical/IR photometry and stellar masses of submillimetre galaxies in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Nestor D (2008) Measurements of Ca ii absorption, metals and dust in a sample of z ? 1 DLAs and subDLAs ? in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Maddox N (2008) Luminous K -band selected quasars from UKIDSS in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Serjeant S (2008) The SCUBA Half Degree Extragalactic Survey (SHADES) - IX. The environment, mass and redshift dependence of star formation in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society