The Herschel Fornax Cluster Survey I: The Bright Galaxy Sample

TL;DR

This paper presents Herschel observations of the Fornax galaxy cluster, analyzing dust, gas, and stellar properties of 11 bright galaxies, and compares these findings with the Virgo cluster and local field, revealing environmental effects on galaxy composition.

Contribution

First detailed Herschel FIR survey of Fornax's bright galaxies, providing comparative analysis with Virgo and insights into cluster environmental impacts on galaxy dust and gas content.

Findings

Fornax has a higher FIR luminosity density than Virgo.

Dust temperatures and masses are comparable between Fornax and Virgo.

Fornax shows a significant gas loss relative to stars and dust.

Abstract

We present Herschel observations of the Fornax cluster at 100, 160, 250, 350 and 500u with a spatial resolution of 7 - 36 arc sec (10" = 1 kpc at d_Fornax=17.9 Mpc). We define a sample of 11 bright galaxies, selected at 500u, directly comparable with our past work on Virgo. We find good agreement with previous observations made by IRAS and Planck. The FIR luminosity density is higher (factor of three) in Fornax compared to Virgo. The 100u (42.5-122.5u) luminosity is two orders of magnitude larger in Fornax than in the local field as measured by IRAS. Using stellar (L_{0.4-2.5}) and FIR (L_{100-500}) luminosities we estimate a mean optical depth of tau=0.4+/-0.1 - the same value as Virgo. For 10 of the 11 galaxies (NGC1399 excepted) we fit a modified blackbody curve (beta=2.0) to the SEDs to derive dust masses and temperatures of 10^{6.54-8.35} M_0 and T=14.6-24.2K respectively, comparable to Virgo. The derived stars-to-gas(atomic) and gas(atomic)-to-dust ratios vary from 1.1-67.6 and 9.8-436.5 respectively, again consistent with Virgo. Fornax is a mass overdensity in stars and dust of about 120 compared to the local field (30 for Virgo). Fornax and Virgo are both a factor of 6 lower over densities in gas(atomic) than in stars and dust indicating loss of gas, but not dust and stars, in the cluster environment. As the brightest FIR source in either Fornax and Virgo, NGC1365 is detected by Planck. The Planck data fit the PACS/SPIRE SED out to 1382u with no evidence of other sources of emission ('spinning dust', free-free, synchrotron). At the opposite end of the scale NGC1399 is detected only at 500$\mu$m with the emission probably arising from the nuclear radio source rather than inter-stellar dust.