Comprehensive comparison of models for spectral energy distributions from 0.1 μm to 1 mm of nearby star-forming galaxies

¹ INAF/Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, Largo Enrico Fermi 5, 50125 Firenze, Italy
e-mail: hunt@arcetri.astro.it
² Department of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK
³ Sterrenkundig Observatorium, Universiteit Gent, Krijgslaan 281 S9, 9000 Gent, Belgium
⁴ Centro de Astronomía (CITEVA), Universidad de Antofagasta, Avenida Angamos 601, Antofagasta, Chile
⁵ National Optical Astronomy Observatory, 950 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ, 85719 USA
⁶ Instituto de Astrofísica, Facultad de Física, Pontificia, Universidad Católica de Chile, 306 Santiago 22, Chile
⁷ INAF/Osservatorio di Astrofisica e Scienza dello Spazio di Bologna, Via Gobetti 93/3, 40129 Bologna, Italy
⁸ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY, 82071 USA
⁹ INAF/Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, Via G. B. Tiepolo 11, 34143 Trieste, Italy
¹⁰ Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road, Cambridge, CB3 0HA UK
¹¹ Steward Observatory, University of Arizona, 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ, 85721 USA
¹² Department of Physics & Astronomy, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, 777843 USA
¹³ IRFU, CEA, Université Paris-Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
¹⁴ Université Paris Diderot, AIM, Sorbonne Paris Cité, CEA, CNRS, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
¹⁵ Dept. Física Teórica y del Cosmos, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain
¹⁶ Instituto Universitario Carlos I de Física Teórica y Computacional, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain
¹⁷ Centre for Astrophysics Research, University of Hertfordshire, College Lane, Hatfield, AL10 9AB UK
¹⁸ Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, PO Box 9513 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands
¹⁹ Department of Astronomy, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, 01003 USA
²⁰ Department of Astronomy, The Ohio State University, 4051 McPherson Laboratory, 140 West 18th Avenue, Columbus, OH, 43210 USA
²¹ Illumination Works LLC, 5650 Blazer Parkway, Suite 152, Dublin, OH, 43017 USA
²² Princeton University Observatory, Peyton Hall, Princeton, NJ, 08544-1001 USA
²³ European Southern Observatory, Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2, 85748, Garching, Germany
²⁴ Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Dr., Baltimore, MD, 21218 USA
²⁵ Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, 2611 Australia
²⁶ IPAC, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E. California Blvd, Pasadena, CA, 91125 USA
²⁷ Max-Planck-Institut für Extraterrestrische Physik, Giessenbachstr., 85748 Garching, Germany
²⁸ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY, 11794-3800 USA
²⁹ Department of Astronomy, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, 47404 USA
³⁰ Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, Department of Physics, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA, 92093 USA
³¹ Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Toledo, 2801 W. Bancroft Street, Toledo, OH, 43606 USA
³² Department of Physics and Astronomy, McMaster University, 1280 Main St. W., Hamilton, Ontario, L8S 4M1 Canada

Received: 9 September 2018
Accepted: 6 November 2018

Abstract

We have fit the far-ultraviolet (FUV) to sub-millimeter (850 μm) spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of the 61 galaxies from the Key Insights on Nearby Galaxies: A Far-Infrared Survey with Herschel (KINGFISH). The fitting has been performed using three models: the Code for Investigating GALaxy Evolution (CIGALE), the GRAphite-SILicate approach (GRASIL), and the Multiwavelength Analysis of Galaxy PHYSical properties (MAGPHYS). We have analyzed the results of the three codes in terms of the SED shapes, and by comparing the derived quantities with simple “recipes” for stellar mass (M_star), star-formation rate (SFR), dust mass (M_dust), and monochromatic luminosities. Although the algorithms rely on different assumptions for star-formation history, dust attenuation and dust reprocessing, they all well approximate the observed SEDs and are in generally good agreement for the associated quantities. However, the three codes show very different behavior in the mid-infrared regime: in the 5–10 μm region dominated by PAH emission, and also between 25 and 70 μm where there are no observational constraints for the KINGFISH sample. We find that different algorithms give discordant SFR estimates for galaxies with low specific SFR, and that the standard recipes for calculating FUV absorption overestimate the extinction compared to the SED-fitting results. Results also suggest that assuming a “standard” constant stellar mass-to-light ratio overestimates M_star relative to the SED fitting, and we provide new SED-based formulations for estimating M_star from WISE W1 (3.4 μm) luminosities and colors. From a principal component analysis of M_star, SFR, M_dust, and O/H, we reproduce previous scaling relations among M_star, SFR, and O/H, and find that M_dust can be predicted to within ∼0.3 dex using only M_star and SFR.