Issue |
A&A
Volume 643, November 2020
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | A141 | |
Number of page(s) | 21 | |
Section | Extragalactic astronomy | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202038860 | |
Published online | 17 November 2020 |
Tracing the total molecular gas in galaxies: [CII] and the CO-dark gas⋆
1
AIM, CEA, CNRS, Université Paris-Saclay, Université Paris Diderot, Sorbonne Paris Cité, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
e-mail: suzanne.madden@cea.fr
2
Institut für Theoretische Astrophysik, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg, Albert-Ueberle Str. 2, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany
3
University of Cincinnati, Clermont College, 4200 Clermont College Drive, Batavia, OH 45103, USA
4
Sterrenkundig Observatorium, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281 S9, 9000 Gent, Belgium
5
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK
6
Astronomisches Rechen-Institut, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg, Mönchhofstrasse 12-14, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany
7
LERMA, Observatoire de Paris, PSL Research University, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, 75014 Paris, France
8
Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, 776 Daedeokdae-ro, 34055 Daejeon, Republic of Korea
Received:
6
July
2020
Accepted:
14
August
2020
Context. Molecular gas is a necessary fuel for star formation. The CO (1−0) transition is often used to deduce the total molecular hydrogen but is challenging to detect in low-metallicity galaxies in spite of the star formation taking place. In contrast, the [C II]λ158 μm is relatively bright, highlighting a potentially important reservoir of H2 that is not traced by CO (1−0) but is residing in the C+-emitting regions.
Aims. Here we aim to explore a method to quantify the total H2 mass (MH2) in galaxies and to decipher what parameters control the CO-dark reservoir.
Methods. We present Cloudy grids of density, radiation field, and metallicity in terms of observed quantities, such as [O I], [C I], CO (1−0), [C II], LTIR, and the total MH2. We provide recipes based on these models to derive total MH2 mass estimates from observations. We apply the models to the Herschel Dwarf Galaxy Survey, extracting the total MH2 for each galaxy, and compare this to the H2 determined from the observed CO (1−0) line. This allows us to quantify the reservoir of H2 that is CO-dark and traced by the [C II]λ158 μm.
Results. We demonstrate that while the H2 traced by CO (1−0) can be negligible, the [C II]λ158 μm can trace the total H2. We find 70 to 100% of the total H2 mass is not traced by CO (1−0) in the dwarf galaxies, but is well-traced by [C II]λ158 μm. The CO-dark gas mass fraction correlates with the observed L[C II]/LCO(1−0) ratio. A conversion factor for [C II]λ158 μm to total H2 and a new CO-to-total-MH2 conversion factor as a function of metallicity are presented.
Conclusions. While low-metallicity galaxies may have a feeble molecular reservoir as surmised from CO observations, the presence of an important reservoir of molecular gas that is not detected by CO can exist. We suggest a general recipe to quantify the total mass of H2 in galaxies, taking into account the CO and [C II] observations. Accounting for this CO-dark H2 gas, we find that the star-forming dwarf galaxies now fall on the Schmidt–Kennicutt relation. Their star-forming efficiency is rather normal because the reservoir from which they form stars is now more massive when introducing the [C II] measures of the total H2 compared to the small amount of H2 in the CO-emitting region.
Key words: photon-dominated region / galaxies: ISM / galaxies: dwarf / HII regions / infrared: ISM
Data in Fig. 6 are only available at the CDS via anonymous ftp to cdsarc.u-strasbg.fr (130.79.128.5) or via http://cdsarc.u-strasbg.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/A+A/643/A141
© S. C. Madden et al. 2020
Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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