• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.135-140
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• 2005

This paper summarizes the recent progress made by our group at Seoul National University on studies of the evolution and formation of distant galaxies. Various research projects are currently underway, which include: (i) the number density of distant early-type galaxies (z < 1); (ii) the optical-NIR color gradient of nearby early-type galaxies; (iii) J - K-selected Extremely Red Objects (EROs) in field (CDF-S) and the cluster environment; and (iv) the Lyman-break galaxies in the Spitzer First Look Survey (FLS) field. These works will constrain the mass evolution and the star formation history of galaxies in different environments, and the results will serve as useful contraints on galaxy formation models.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.56.2-56.2
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• 2012

We present a study of the asymptotic giant branch (AGB) contribution to the total Ks band luminosity of star clusters in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) as a function of age. AGB stars, a representative intermediate-age population, are a strong source of NIR to MIR emission so that they are a critical component for understanding the near-to-mid infrared observation of galaxies. Current calibration of IR emission in evolutionary population synthesis (EPS) models for galaxies is mainly based on a small number of LMC star clusters. However, each LMC star cluster with intermediate age contains only a few AGB stars so that it suffers from a stochastic effect. Therefore a large number of them are needed for solid calibration of the EPS models. We study physical properties of a large number of LMC star clusters to estimate the Ks band luminosity fraction of AGB stars in star clusters as a function of age. We discuss the stochastic effect in calibrating models, and the importance of this calibration for studying the evolution of not only nearby galaxies but also of high-z galaxies.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.73.2-73.2
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• 2012

Matusoka & Kawara (2010) showed that the number density of the most massive galaxies (log $M/M_{\odot}=11.5-12.0$) increases faster than that of the next massive group (log $M/M_{\odot}=11.0-11.5$) during 0 < z < 1. This appears to be in contradiction to another important empirical concept of "downsizing". We attempt to understand the two observational findings in the context of the hierarchical merger paradigm using semi-analytic techniques. Our models closely reproduce the result of Matusoka & Kawara (2010). Downsizing can also be understood as larger galaxies have on average smaller assembly ages but larger stellar ages. Our fiducial models further reveal the details on the history of stellar mass growth of massive galaxies. The most massive galaxies (log $M/M_{\odot}=11.5-12.0$ at z=0), which are mostly brightest cluster galaxies, obtain roughly 70% of their stellar components via merger accretion. The role of merger accretion monotonically declines with galaxy mass: 45% for log $M/M_{\odot}=11.0-11.5$ and 20% for log $M/M_{\odot}=10.5-11.0$ at z = 0. The specific accreted stellar mass rates via galaxy mergers decline very slowly during the whole redshift range, while the specific star formation rates sharply decrease with time. In the case of the most massive galaxies, merger accretion becomes the most important channel for the stellar mass growth at z ~ 2. On the other hand, in-situ star formation is always the dominant channel in the $L_*$ galaxies.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.29.3-30
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• 2015

We introduce an advanced one-to-one galaxy correspondence method that populates dark matter halos with galaxies by tracing merging histories of most bound member particles (MBPs) identified in simulated virialized halos. To estimate the survival time of a satellite galaxy, we adopt several models of tidal-destruction time derived from an analytic calculation, isolated galaxy simulations, and cosmological simulations. We build mock galaxy samples for each model by using a merging tree information of MBPs from our new Horizon Run 4 N-body simulation from z = 12 to 0. For models of galaxy survival time derived from cosmological and isolated galaxy simulations, about 40% of satellites galaxies merged into a certain halo are survived until z = 0. We compare mock galaxy samples from our MBP-galaxy correspondence scheme and the subhalo-galaxy scheme with SDSS volume-limited galaxy samples around z = 0 with $M_r-5{\log}h$ < -21 and -20. Compared to the subhalo-galaxy correspondence method, our method predicts more satellite galaxies close to their host halo center and larger pairwise peculiar velocity of galaxies. As a result, our method reproduces the observed galaxy group mass function, the number of member galaxies, and the two-point correlation functions while the subhalo-galaxy correspondence method underestimates them.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.53-58
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• 1998

The $H{\beta}$ and some metal line indices, such as Mg2, Fe52 of single-age and single-metallicity populations are computed based on the method of evolutionary population synthesis, with careful consideration of the variation of the horizontal-branch morphology with metallicity and age. We find (a) that while metal lines are little af-fected, the $H{\beta}$ index is severely enhanced (up to 30%)by the presence of the blue horizontal-branch stars, frustrating the current age-estimations from this index with out careful consideration of these stars, and (b) that there is a systematic trend in the sense that the globular clusters in giant elliptical galaxies appear to be older than those in our Galaxy by several billion years. We also calculate these indices for the stellar populations with a metallicity spread, by adopting metallicity distribution functions predicted by chemical evolution models. The comparison of the models with the observed indices of the central regions of the early-type galaxies yields the results (a) that the ages of the giant elliptical galaxies would be older than the previous estimations by several billion years, and (b) that there is a considerable age spread among elliptical galaxies, in the sense that the giant elliptical galaxies are older than small ones.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.41.2-41.2
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• 2013

We present a very wide-field survey of dwarf galaxies in the M106 Group using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 8, covering an area of $10^{\circ}{\times}14^{\circ}$ around M106. We select 18 new members of the M106 group, 10 of which are new findings. Surface brightness profiles of most of these galaxies are fitted well by an exponential law. Twelve of these galaxies are early-types, and the rest are late-types. We produce a master catalog of the M106 Group galaxies by combining these new galaxies with 30 known galaxies. The faint-end of the luminosity function of these galaxies is fitted by a power law with an index ${\alpha}=-1.22{\pm}0.02$. This slope is much flatter than the value predicted by the ${\Lambda}CDM$ models, but is similar to the values for other galaxy groups. The spatial distribution of the dwarf galaxies in the M106 group is quite different from that of the bright members of the group, requiring a further study.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.39.1-39.1
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• 2014

We present the results of our analysis of the RR Lyrae (RRL) variable stars detected in two transition-type dwarf galaxies (dTrans), ESO294-G010 and ESO410-G005 in the Sculptor group, which is known to be one of the closest neighboring galaxy groups to our Local Group. Using deep archival images from the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) onboard the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), we have identified a sample of RR Lyrae candidates in both dTrans galaxies [219 RRab (RR0) and 13 RRc (RR1) variables in ESO294-G010; 225 RRab and 44 RRc stars in ESO410-G005]. The metallicities of the individual RRab stars are calculated via the period-amplitude-[Fe/H] relation derived by Alcock et al. This yields mean metallicities of <[Fe/H]>_{ESO294} = -1.77 +/- 0.03 and <[Fe/H]>_{ESO410} = -1.64+/- 0.03. The RRL metallicity distribution functions (MDFs) are investigated further via simple chemical evolution models; these reveal the relics of the early chemical enrichment processes for these two dTrans galaxies. In the case of both galaxies, the shapes of the RRL MDFs are well-described by pre-enrichment models. This suggests two possible channels for the early chemical evolution for these Sculptor group dTrans galaxies: 1) The ancient stellar populations of our target dwarf galaxies might have formed from the star forming gas which was already enriched through "prompt initial enrichment" or an "initial nucleosynthetic spike" from the very first massive stars, or 2) this pre-enrichment state might have been achieved by the end products from more evolved systems of their nearest neighbor, NGC 55.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.42.1-42.1
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• 2013

In the LCDM paradigm, hierarchical merging is thought to play a key role in the formation and evolution of massive galaxies. Theoretical and observational studies suggest that massive galaxies started forming at high redshifts and were assembled via numerous mergers. Galaxy clusters are the sites where the most massive galaxies are found and the most dramatic merger histories are embedded. The previous work of Sheen et al. (2012) identified via visual inspection many massive galaxies with merger features in clusters, which surprised the community. In this study we aim to quantify peculiarity of galaxies to pin down the merger frequency in cluster environments more objectively. We have performed optical deep imaging of 4 Abell clusters by using IMACS f/2 on a Magellan Badde 6.5-m telescope. For the galaxies in our data, we applied GALFIT algorithm, which fits analytic models to galaxy data, and we analyzed their residuals. We present the preliminary results of our sample galaxies.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.35.4-35.4
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• 2019

Understanding the interplay between galaxies and dark matter in the universe is one of key challenges in modern astrophysics. This provides an important test of structure formation scenarios and cosmological models. I discuss three aspects of this test: (1) comparing the matter distribution from galaxy redshift surveys with that from weak-lensing surveys, (2) statistical comparison of large-scale structures between observations and cosmological simulations, and (3) multi-wavelength study of galaxies. These tests underscore the importance of combining photometric and spectroscopic surveys in observations along with cosmological simulations for exploring and understanding the structure formation.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.36.2-36.2
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• 2018

Radiative transfer models were developed to understand the optical polarizations in edge-on galaxies, which are observed to occur even outside the geometrically thin dust disk, with a scale height of ~0.2 kpc. In order to reproduce the vertically extended polarization structure, we find it is essential to include a geometrically thick dust layer in the radiative transfer model, in addition to the commonly-known thin dust layer. The models include polarizations due to both dust scattering and dichroic extinction which is responsible for the observed interstellar polarization in the Milky Way. It is found that the magnetic fields in edge-on galaxies are in general vertical (or poloidal) except the central part, where the magnetic fields are mainly toroidal. We also find that the polarization level is enhanced if the clumpiness of the interstellar medium, and the dichroic extinction by vertical magnetic fields in the outer regions of the dust lane are included in the radiative transfer model. The predicted degree of polarization outside the dust lane was found to be consistent with that (ranging from 1% to 4%) observed in NGC 891.