AAS 207th Meeting, 8-12 January 2006
Session 21 Starbursts, LIRGS and ULIRGS
Poster, Monday, 9:20am-7:00pm, January 9, 2006, Exhibit Hall

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[21.02] Metallicity and Star Formation in High EW(H-alpha) Galaxies

J. E. Pollack (New College of Florida), L. J. Kewley, D. Sanders (University of Hawaii), M. J. Geller (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory)

We present an investigation into the chemical abundances and star formation properties of the central regions in ~330 Updated Zwicky Catalog (UZC) galaxies at cz > 5000 km/s. These galaxies were selected to have strong bursts of recent star formation by constraining the sample to galaxies with high EW(H-alpha) and detectable 60-micron IRAS fluxes. Spectra were obtained for the 330 galaxies with the CfA FAST spectrograph. We calculate metallicities using Kewley and Dopita's (2000) metallicity and ionization parameter diagnostics using the [NII], [OII], [OIII], [SII], and the Balmer emission lines. We use stellar population synthesis models to derive the age of the recent bursts of star formation. Finally, we investigate the metallicity and burst age in terms of morphology and the presence of companions.

Funding for this research was provided by the National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates program hosted by the Institute for Astronomy at University of Hawaii-Manoa.


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