The effects of bar strength and kinematics on galaxy evolution: slow strong bars affect their hosts the most

TL;DR

This study investigates how bar strength and kinematics influence star formation in galaxies, revealing that strong, slow bars significantly impact local star formation patterns without altering overall galaxy star formation rates.

Contribution

It provides new insights into how bar strength and slow kinematics specifically affect the spatial distribution of star formation in galaxies.

Findings

Strong bars enhance central and end-region star formation.

Weak bars show similar profiles to unbarred galaxies.

Slow bars have higher star formation along the bar than fast bars.

Abstract

We study how bar strength and bar kinematics affect star formation in different regions of the bar by creating radial profiles of EW[H$\alpha$] and D$_{\rm n}$4000 using data from SDSS-IV MaNGA. Bars in galaxies are classified as strong or weak using Galaxy Zoo DESI, and they are classified as fast and slow bars using the Tremaine-Weinberg method on stellar kinematic data from the MaNGA survey. In agreement with previous studies, we find that strong bars in star forming galaxies have enhanced star formation in their centre and beyond the bar-end region, while star formation is suppressed in the arms of the bar. This is not found for weakly barred galaxies, which have very similar radial profiles to unbarred galaxies. In addition, we find that slow bars in star forming galaxies have significantly higher star formation along the bar than fast bars. However, the global star formation rate is not significantly different between galaxies with fast and slow bars. This suggests that the kinematics of the bar do not affect star formation globally, but changes where star formation occurs in the galaxy. Thus, we find that a bar will influence its host the most if it is both strong and slow.