Stellar Populations of Elliptical Galaxies in the Local Universe
Guangtun Zhu, Michael R. Blanton (NYU), and John Moustakas (UCSD)

TL;DR
This study analyzes the stellar populations of nearly 2,000 elliptical galaxies in the local universe, revealing how their properties vary with velocity dispersion and environment, and providing insights into their formation histories.
Contribution
It offers a comprehensive comparison of stellar populations in elliptical galaxies across different environments and mass ranges using SDSS data, highlighting environmental effects on galaxy evolution.
Findings
Lower-sigma galaxies are bluer and have stronger emission lines.
Field ellipticals are slightly bluer and have stronger emission lines than group ellipticals.
Group ellipticals are older, more metal-rich, and more alpha-enhanced than field counterparts.
Abstract
We study the stellar populations of 1,923 elliptical galaxies at z<0.05 selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey as a function of velocity dispersion, sigma, and environment. We construct average, high signal-to-noise spectra and find the following: (1) lower-sigma galaxies have a bluer optical continuum and stronger (but still weak) emission lines; (2) at fixed sigma, field ellipticals have a slightly bluer stellar continuum, especially at wavelengths \lesssim 4000 \AA, and have stronger (but still weak) emission lines compared to their group counterparts, although this environmental dependence is strongest for low-sigma ellipticals. Based on Lick indices measured from both the individual and average spectra, we find that: (1) at a given sigma, elliptical galaxies in groups have systematically weaker Balmer absorption than their field counterparts, although this environmental…
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