A Search for Spectral Galaxy Pairs of Overlapping Galaxies based on Fuzzy Recognition

TL;DR

This paper develops a fuzzy recognition method to identify spectral galaxy pairs with overlapping galaxies in SDSS data, revealing new insights into dust properties and star formation in such systems.

Contribution

Introduces a fuzzy set theory-based approach to identify spectral galaxy pairs, enabling detection of faint or dim systems overlooked by traditional imaging methods.

Findings

165 SGP spectra identified from SDSS DR9

Dust extinction estimated via Balmer decrement

Potential new star-forming region in the Milky Way

Abstract

The Spectral Galaxy Pairs (SGPs) are defined as the composite galaxy spectra which contain two independent redshift systems. These spectra are useful for studying dust properties of the foreground galaxies. In this paper, a total of 165 spectra of SGPs are mined out from Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release 9 (DR9) using the concept of membership degree from the fuzzy set theory particularly defined to be suitable for fuzzily identifying emission lines. The spectra and images of this sample are classified according to the membership degree and their image features, respectively. Many of these 2nd redshift systems are too small or too dim to select from the SDSS images alone, making the sample a potentially unique source of information on dust effects in low-luminosity or low-surface-brightness galaxies that are underrepresented in morphological pair samples. The dust extinction of the objects with high membership degree is also estimated by Balmer decrement. Additionally, analyses for a series of spectroscopic observations of one SGP from 165 systems indicate that a newly star-forming region of our Milky Way might occur.