UNC-CH Physics and Astronomy Colloquium

Rachel Kuzio de Naray, Georgia State University

“What is the MUSCEL behind Low Surface Brightness Galaxies?”

Low surface brightness galaxies are disk galaxies that are characterized by their gas richness, low gas surface densities, low past and current star formation rates, blue colors, low metal abundances, and kinematics that are dominated by dark matter. While they span the same range of masses as their high surface brightness “normal” counterparts, they have clearly taken a different evolutionary path. Why is this? Why do they have so few stars? Why do their dark matter halos look the way they do? I will present spectroscopic and photometric observations that explore the properties of these galaxies. I will also discuss our efforts to answer these questions as part of the MUSCEL (MUltiwavelength observations of the Structure, Chemistry, and Evolution of LSB galaxies) Program.