Journal
NATURE ASTRONOMY
Volume 3, Issue 2, Pages 178-182Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/s41550-018-0627-5
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Funding
- CNPq
- CAPES
- FAPESP
- France-Brazil CAPES/Cofecub programme
- Global Impact Award from Google
- Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
- US Department of Energy Office of Science
- Center for High Performance Computing at the University of Utah
- Brazilian Participation Group
- Carnegie Institution for Science
- Carnegie Mellon University
- Chilean Participation Group
- French Participation Group
- Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
- Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias
- Johns Hopkins University
- Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe/University of Tokyo
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
- Leibniz Institut fur Astrophysik Potsdam
- Max-Planck-Institut fur Astronomie (Heidelberg)
- Max-Planck-Institut fur Astrophysik (Garching)
- Max-Planck-Institut fur Extraterrestrische Physik
- National Astronomical Observatories of China
- New Mexico State University
- New York University
- University of Notre Dame
- Observatorio Nacional/MCTI
- Ohio State University
- Pennsylvania State University
- Shanghai Astronomical Observatory
- United Kingdom Participation Group
- Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
- University of Arizona
- University of Colorado Boulder
- University of Oxford
- University of Portsmouth
- University of Utah
- University of Virginia
- University of Washington
- University of Wisconsin
- Vanderbilt University
- Yale University
- STFC [ST/L000695/1, ST/P000614/1] Funding Source: UKRI
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The exact nature of the arms of spiral galaxies is still an open question(1). It has been widely assumed that spiral arms in galaxies with two distinct symmetrical arms are the products of density waves that propagate around the disk, with the spiral arms being visibly enhanced by the star formation that is triggered as the passing wave compresses gas in the galaxy disk(1-3). Such a persistent wave would propagate with an approximately constant angular speed, its pattern speed OP. The quasi-stationary density wave theory can be tested by measuring this quantity and showing that it does not vary with radius in the galaxy. Unfortunately, this measurement is difficult because Omega(P) is only indirectly connected to observables such as the stellar rotation speed(4-6). Here, we use the detailed information on stellar populations of the grand-design spiral galaxy UGC 3825, extracted from spectral mapping, to measure the offset between young stars of a known age and the spiral arm in which they formed, allowing a direct measurement of Omega(P) at a range of radii. The offset in this galaxy is found to be as expected for a pattern speed that varies little with radius, indicating consistency with a quasi-stationary density wave, and lending credence to this new method.
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