Resolution-independent modeling of environmental effects in semi-analytic models of galaxy formation that include ram-pressure stripping of both hot and cold gas

TL;DR

This paper improves semi-analytic galaxy formation models by incorporating an analytic approach to track unresolved subhaloes and modeling ram-pressure stripping, leading to better convergence but still facing discrepancies with observed quenched galaxy fractions.

Contribution

It introduces a resolution-independent analytic model for subhalo tracking and a new physical model for ram-pressure stripping in semi-analytic galaxy formation models.

Findings

Enhanced convergence between Millennium simulations for satellite quenching.

Identified discrepancies between model predictions and observed quenched fractions.

Highlighting the need for further physical process modeling improvements.

Abstract

The quenching of star formation in satellite galaxies is observed over a wide range of dark matter halo masses and galaxy environments. In the recent Guo et al (2011) and Fu et al (2013) semi-analytic + N-body models, the gaseous environment of the satellite galaxy is governed by the properties of the dark matter subhalo in which it resides. This quantity depends of the resolution of the N-body simulation, leading to a divergent fraction of quenched satellites in high- and low-resolution simulations. Here, we incorporate an analytic model to trace the subhaloes below the resolution limit. We demonstrate that we then obtain better converged results between the Millennium I and II simulations, especially for the satellites in the massive haloes ($\rm log M_{halo}=[14,15]$). We also include a new physical model for the ram-pressure stripping of cold gas in satellite galaxies. However, we find very clear discrepancies with observed trends in quenched satellite galaxy fractions as a function of stellar mass at fixed halo mass. At fixed halo mass, the quenched fraction of satellites does not depend on stellar mass in the models, but increases strongly with mass in the data. In addition to the over-prediction of low-mass passive satellites, the models also predict too few quenched central galaxies with low stellar masses, so the problems in reproducing quenched fractions are not purely of environmental origin. Further improvements to the treatment of the gas-physical processes regulating the star formation histories of galaxies are clearly necessary to resolve these problems.