Xunda Sun, Xin Wang, Xiangcheng Ma, Kai Wang, Andrew Wetzel, Claude-André Faucher-Giguère, Philip F. Hopkins, Dušan Kereš, Russell L. Graf, Andrew Marszewski, Jonathan Stern, Guochao Sun, Lei Sun, Keyer Thyme
{"title":"The physical origin of positive metallicity radial gradients in high-redshift galaxies: insights from the FIRE-2 cosmological hydrodynamic simulations","authors":"Xunda Sun, Xin Wang, Xiangcheng Ma, Kai Wang, Andrew Wetzel, Claude-André Faucher-Giguère, Philip F. Hopkins, Dušan Kereš, Russell L. Graf, Andrew Marszewski, Jonathan Stern, Guochao Sun, Lei Sun, Keyer Thyme","doi":"arxiv-2409.09290","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Using the FIRE-2 cosmological zoom-in simulations, we investigate the\ntemporal evolution of gas-phase metallicity radial gradients of Milky Way-mass\nprogenitors in the redshift range of $0.4<z<3$. We pay special attention to the\noccurrence of positive (i.e. inverted) metallicity gradients -- where\nmetallicity increases with galactocentric radius. This trend, contrary to the\nmore commonly observed negative radial gradients, has been frequently seen in\nrecent spatially resolved grism observations. The occurrence rate of positive\ngradients in FIRE-2 is about $\\sim10\\%$ for $0.4<z<3$, and $\\sim16\\%$ at higher\nredshifts ($1.5<z<3$), broadly consistent with observations. Moreover, we\ninvestigate the correlations among galaxy metallicity gradient, stellar mass,\nstar formation rate (SFR), and degree of rotational support. Our results show\nthat galaxies with lower mass, higher specific SFR (sSFR), and more turbulent\ndisks are more likely to exhibit positive metallicity gradients. The FIRE-2\nsimulations show evidence for positive gradients that occur both before and/or\nafter major episodes of star formation, manifesting as sharp rises in a\ngalaxy's star-formation history. Positive gradients occurring before major\nstar-formation episodes are likely caused by metal-poor gas inflows, whereas\nthose appearing afterwards often result from metal-enriched gas outflows,\ndriven by strong stellar feedback. Our results support the important role of\nstellar feedback in governing the chemo-structural evolution and disk formation\nof Milky Way-mass galaxies at the cosmic noon epoch.","PeriodicalId":501187,"journal":{"name":"arXiv - PHYS - Astrophysics of Galaxies","volume":"77 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"arXiv - PHYS - Astrophysics of Galaxies","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/arxiv-2409.09290","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Using the FIRE-2 cosmological zoom-in simulations, we investigate the
temporal evolution of gas-phase metallicity radial gradients of Milky Way-mass
progenitors in the redshift range of $0.4