The ISM properties under ICM pressure in the cluster environment : NGC4330, NGC4402, NGC4522, NGC4569

  • Published : 2012.10.17

Abstract

The interstellar medium (ISM) of galaxies in the galaxy cluster can well be affected by the intracluster medium (ICM). Among many suggested environmental processes, ram pressure stripping can effectively remove gas through the interaction with the ICM. In fact, Cluster galaxies are lower in HI gas mass compared to their field counterparts, and in recent high resolution HI imaging studies, many galaxies in dense environments have been found to be ram pressure stripped in HI. However, it is still under debate whether the ICM pressure can also remove dense molecular gas from the galactic disk, which plays more important role in star formation and hence galaxy evolution. To answer this question, we have obtained high resolution 12/13 CO (2-1) data from the Sub Millimeter Array (SMA) of four galaxies at various HI stripping stages to study how the molecular gas properties change as the galaxy experiences the ICM pressure. We investigate the physical properties of molecular gas with 12/13 CO images. By comparing with other wavelength data, i.e. data(optical, HI, $H{\alpha}$, etc), we discuss how and in which timescale galaxies can migrate from the blue cloud to the red sequence due to ram pressure stripping.

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