THE LYMAN ALPHA MORPHOLOGY OF LOCAL STARBURST GALAXIES: RELEASE OF CALIBRATED IMAGES

We present reduced and calibrated high resolution Lyman-alpha (Ly alpha) images for a sample of six local star-forming galaxies. Targets were selected to represent a range in luminosity and metallicity and to include both known Ly alpha emitters and nonemitters. Far ultraviolet imaging was carried out with the Solar Blind Channel of the Advanced Camera for Surveys on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) in the F122M (Ly alpha online) and F140LP (continuum) filters. The resulting Ly alpha images are the product of careful modeling of both the stellar and nebular continua, facilitated by supporting HST imaging at lambda approximate to 2200, 3300, 4400, 5500, H alpha, and 8000 angstrom, combined with Starburst 99 evolutionary synthesis models, and prescriptions for dust extinction on the continuum. In all, the resulting morphologies in Ly alpha, H alpha, and UV continuum are qualitatively very different and we show that the bulk of Ly alpha emerges in a diffuse component resulting from resonant scattering events. Ly alpha escape fractions, computed from integrated H alpha luminosities and recombination theory, are found never to exceed 14%. Internal dust extinction is estimated in each pixel and used to correct Ly alpha fluxes. However, the extinction corrections are far too small (by factors from 2.6 to infinity) to reconcile the emerging global Ly alpha luminosities with standard recombination predictions. Surprisingly, when comparing the global equivalent widths of Ly alpha and H alpha, the two quantities appear to be anticorrelated, which may be due to the evolution of mechanical feedback from the starburst. This calls for caution in the interpretation of Ly alpha observations in terms of star formation rates. The images presented have a physical resolution 3 orders of magnitude better than attainable at high redshifts from the ground with current instrumentation and our images may therefore serve as useful templates for comparing with observations and modeling of primeval galaxy formation. We therefore provide the reduced Ly alpha, H alpha, and continuum images to the community.