Research Note Is SBS 0335-052 a young galaxy?

¹ Stockholm Observatory, 13336 Saltsjöbaden, Sweden
² Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris (IAP), 98 bis Boulevard Arago, 75014 Paris, France e-mail: kunth@iap.fr

Corresponding author: G. Östlin, ostlin@astro.su.se

Received: 30 November 2000
Accepted: 2 March 2001

Abstract

The metal-poor blue compact galaxy SBS 0335-052 has been put forward as a local primeval galaxy candidate, with a proposed age less than 10⁸ years. If true, this would imply that galaxy formation was not confined to high red-shifts, but is still occurring in the local Universe, albeit at a slower rate. In this paper we show that some of the available data in the literature on SBS 0335-052 indicate an age significantly greater than 10⁸ years. In view of this, the conclusion that SBS 0335-052 is a newly formed galaxy appears premature. We point out that single burst models in general give lower limits on age estimates, which should be borne in mind when assessing ages for distant galaxies.