The Role of Dwarf-Dwarf Galaxy Interactions Over Cosmic Time

Occidental College, Los Angeles CA

Investigators

Abstract

According to current understanding, large galaxies like our Milky Way are built through the merging together of smaller, dwarf galaxies, and yet research into these important merging events is still mostly uncharted territory. The numbers of known dwarfs in the nearby universe is about to sky-rocket with upcoming planned large surveys and the next generation thirty-meter class telescopes, but we lack answers to even basic questions surrounding their evolution. This project investigates the physical processes at work in a unique set of dwarfs caught in the act of merging. Since Los Angeles, the hub for this program, is known more for its traffic than for its clear skies, the investigators will develop a traveling planetarium program. This program will be run by undergraduates and it will bring science to those who normally would not have access to such an outreach program. Audiences will include low income, predominantly minority groups, while encouraging the students involved to become leaders in their academic and local communities. This project leverages the first systematic study of interacting dwarf galaxies, TiNy Titans, to investigate the impact of dwarf-dwarf interactions on galaxy evolution at all mass scales through a set of multiwavelength observations. Specifically, the project will produce the first comprehensive data sets of deep narrowband Halpha and broadband optical imaging, radio line and continuum maps of a large, systematically-selected sample of interacting dwarf galaxies and it will provide direct test of cosmological predictions. The main scientific goals of this project are aimed at quantifying the physical processes taking place in dwarf-dwarf interactions, including how star formation and gas processing behave in dwarf galaxies which are low metallicity, highly impacted by interactions, and may mirror conditions in the early universe. This project builds upon the extensive efforts by Occidental College to recruit underrepresented minority and first generation college-bound undergraduate students into science by providing these students with hands-on experience traveling to telescopes, conducting their own data reduction, and presenting their own results at national conferences. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.