RSAA Colloquia / Seminars / Feast-of-Facts: Thursday, 07 December 2017, 11:00-12:00; Duffield Lecture Theatre


Andrew Battisti

"Characterizing Dust Attenuation in Local Star Forming Galaxies"

The presence of dust in galaxies significantly alters their observed spectral energy distributions. If not properly accounted for, this will lead to incorrect estimates for many derived quantities, such as the star formation rate, stellar mass, and photometric redshift. Virtually all studies of star forming galaxies, both local and distant, make use the attenuation curve derived from a small sample of local starburst galaxies to correct for the effects of dust. However, it is not clear how reasonable the general application of this curve is for typical galaxies or as a function of redshift. I will present results from utilizing ~10,000 local (z<0.1) star forming galaxies to derive average dust attenuation curves and to identify the extent to which attenuation curves vary as a function of various galactic properties.