# The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies

## 1. Introduction

Galaxy detection in many optical surveys, especially those based on photographic data, suffers strong selection effects as a function of surface brightness. The difficulty of detecting low surface brightness galaxies is well accepted (Impey, Bothun & Malin (1988); Ferguson & McGaugh (1995)), but at the other extreme, it has been argued that there is no strong selection against high surface brightness galaxies (Allen & Shu (1979); van der Kruit (1987)). Most galaxy surveys based on photographic material ($`B_J<21`$) have assumed—implicitly—that very few, if any, galaxies are unresolved (e.g. Maddox et al. 1990a ). Morton, Krug & Tritton (1985) attempted to check this, taking spectra of all 606 stellar objects brighter than $`B=20`$ in an area of 0.31$`\mathrm{deg}^2`$ but found no galaxies. Colless et al. (1991) found seven galaxies among a sample of 117 faint compact objects, but these were so faint ($`B_J22.5`$) that the image classifications were not conclusive.

Many unresolved galaxies have been found in QSO surveys (Downes & Margon, (1981); Koo & Kron (1988); Boyle et al. (1991)). More recently the Edinburgh-Cape blue object survey (Stobie et al. (1997)) and the Anglo-Australian Observatory 2dF QSO redshift survey (Boyle et al. (1998)) have produced further examples. Many compact galaxies have also been found among H II galaxies in objective prism surveys: some 50% of these have starlike morphology (Melnick (1987)). The compact narrow emission line galaxies (CNELGs) found in the Koo & Kron (1988) survey have been studied in detail (Koo et al. (1994, 1995); Guzmán et al. (1996, 1998)): 35 have been found in an area of 1.2$`\mathrm{deg}^2`$ to a magnitude limit of $`B_J=22.5`$. These are very blue with luminosities, scale sizes and emission line spectra typical of nearby luminous H II galaxies (cf. Salzer et al. (1989); Terlevich et al. (1991); Gallego et al. (1997)). Similar galaxies have been found at higher ($`0.4<z<1`$) redshifts (Phillips et al. (1997)) and their distribution may even extend to $`z3`$ (Lowenthal et al. (1997)).

In this Letter we describe a new sample of bright ($`B_J20.1`$), compact galaxies unresolved on the photographic sky survey plates commonly used to create galaxy catalogs. Unlike previous work, this sample is from a complete spectroscopic survey of all objects in an area of sky, so we can estimate the fraction of all galaxies which are compact. A population of compact galaxies missing in normal galaxy surveys (e.g. Colless (1998)) would be important for several reasons (Schade & Ferguson (1994)).

## 2. The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey

The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey (see Drinkwater et al. (1998) for details) is designed to provide a census of galaxies in the local Universe free of morphological selection criteria. We are using the Two-degree Field spectrograph (2dF) on the Anglo-Australian Telescope to obtain spectra for all 14,000 objects, stellar and non-stellar, in four 2dF fields ($`12.5\mathrm{deg}^2`$) centered on the Fornax Cluster, with magnitude limits of $`16.5<B_J<19.7`$ (and somewhat deeper for unresolved images). Our targets are drawn from a UK Schmidt $`B_J`$ sky survey plate centered on the Fornax Cluster (Phillipps et al. (1987)) digitized by the Automated Plate Measuring facility (APM) (Irwin, Maddox & McMahon, (1994)). Although we observe objects of all morphological types, we used the automated APM classifications of the objects as “stellar” (probably stars) or “resolved” (probably galaxies) to optimize our photographic photometry. The magnitudes of the resolved objects were measured by fitting exponential intensity profiles to the run of area against isophotal threshold in the APM data (Davies et al. (1988); Davies (1990)). The stellar $`B_J`$ magnitudes were taken from the APM catalog data (Irwin, Maddox & McMahon, (1994)) which uses internal self-calibration to fit stellar profiles, correcting for the non-linear response of the photographic emulsion.

Here we present preliminary results from the first field centered at $`\alpha =03^h38^m29^s,\delta =35\mathrm{°}27\mathrm{}01\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) observed in Semesters 1996B and 1997B. We observed and identified 992 (77%) of the resolved objects to a limit of $`B_J<19.7`$, 675 (38%) of stellar objects to the same limit and a total of 1112 (43%) of the stellar objects to the deeper limit of $`B_J<20.2`$. Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies shows the completeness of our observations as a function of magnitude and color. Our main result is that thirteen of the “stellar” objects have recession velocities of 14,000–60,000$`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (see Table 1). These galaxies are well beyond the Fornax Cluster ($`v1500\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) and most (nine) have strong emission line spectra.

## 3. Properties of the new galaxies

In Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies we compare the distribution of the new compact galaxies to previously detected CNELGs (Koo et al. (1994, 1995)) in magnitude-redshift space. There is considerable overlap in absolute magnitude, but as expected from a larger area survey with a brighter magnitude limit, our galaxies occupy a region in this diagram at lower redshift and brighter apparent magnitude.

The compact nature of the new galaxies prohibits a detailed analysis of their scale sizes and central surface brightness using our imaging data. The galaxy images are unresolved on photographic sky survey plates ($`1\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5`$ seeing FWHM). We therefore estimate conservative upper limits (not correcting for photographic saturation which occurs at about 21$`B\mathrm{mag}\mathrm{arcsec}^2`$) to their scale lengths to be $`1^{\prime \prime }`$ (assuming an image FWHM of $`1\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5`$). This upper limit has been confirmed by a CCD image of one of the galaxies taken with the CTIO<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>1CTIO is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy Inc. (AURA), under a cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation as part of the National Optical Astronomy Observatories. 1.5m Telescope which was only marginally resolved in $`1\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}2`$ seeing. At the range of distances indicated, this corresponds to physical scale sizes of 1–4 kpc<sup>2</sup><sup>2</sup>2We adopt $`H_0=50\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{Mpc}^1`$ and $`q_0=0.1`$., somewhat smaller than local spiral galaxies (de Jong (1996)) and at least as small as CNELGs and luminous H II galaxies (Phillips et al. (1997)). Despite the small scales, these galaxies are not dwarfs in terms of their luminosities which are within a factor 10 or so of $`L_{}`$; indeed some of them exceed $`L_{}`$. This is because of their high surface brightnesses: the scale size limits of $`1^{\prime \prime }`$ imply central surface brightnesses 19–21$`B\mathrm{mag}\mathrm{arcsec}^2`$, as bright as the CNELGs and the luminous H II galaxies (Phillips et al. (1997)).

We obtained Cousins BVI CCD images of our survey region using the CTIO Curtis Schmidt Telescope. The low spatial resolution (3″ FWHM) leaves the compact galaxies unresolved but the data allow us to calculate photometry and aperture ($`8^{\prime \prime }`$ radius) colors. The K-corrected $`BV`$ colors (Table 1) of the emission-line compact galaxies place them among the CNELG and H II galaxies, and are consistent with relatively high recent star formation rates (Larson & Tinsley (1978)).

The nine emission-line compact galaxies all have strong narrow H$`\alpha `$ lines: none are resolved at our resolution of 9 Å or 450$`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The H$`\alpha `$ rest equivalent widths listed in Table 1 nearly all exceed the mean value for our overall background sample of emission line objects of $`EW(\mathrm{H}\alpha )37`$ Å, typical of local spirals (Kennicutt (1992)). The values for the compact galaxies, $``$30–190 Å are more like those seen in low redshift H II galaxies (Gallego et al. (1997)). Given the range of overall sizes of these objects, it is interesting to consider what Cowie et al. (1996) call the stellar mass doubling time, i.e. the time it would take for the current star formation rate (SFR) to double the existing underlying stellar mass. This can be derived directly from the equivalent widths: Cowie et al. note that $`EW(\mathrm{H}\alpha )60`$ Å separates galaxies undergoing rapid star formation, with mass doubling times less than $`10^{10}`$ years, from those with moderate SFRs which can be maintained for a Hubble time. At the highest SFR, Cowie et al. find that a mass doubling time of $`2\times 10^9`$ years empirically corresponds to their galaxies with $`EW(\mathrm{H}\alpha )125`$ Å. Our fastest star formers, like J0338$``$3545, should have mass doubling times of this order.

In Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies we show the \[OIII\]/H$`\beta `$ vs. \[NII\]/H$`\alpha `$ emission line ratio diagram for our new galaxies compared to the Gallego et al. (1997) emission line sample and the Koo et al. CNELGs. This shows that new compact galaxies are actively star-forming as they closely follow the general H II region relationship. They display generally high excitation as measured by \[OIII\]/H$`\beta `$, putting them in the HIIH class more than the starburst nucleus class as defined by Gallego et al. The new compact galaxies have very similar properties to the CNELGs. We do not draw any conclusion from the lack of low excitation objects: this may be a selection effect as we are only considering the unresolved galaxies in our survey in this sample. Similar conclusions can be drawn from a plot of the excitation against absolute magnitude.

We also found four compact galaxies which did not have strong emission lines and are therefore not shown in the excitation diagrams. These are unlikely to have been detected in previous work on compact galaxies because of their weak line emission and generally redder colors which would exclude them from most QSO surveys. One of them, J0339$``$3547, has a post starburst spectrum with strong Balmer absorption lines. We have used the two ratios of absorption feature strengths CaIIH+H$`ϵ`$/CaIIK and H$`\delta `$/FeI4045 to estimate the age of the galaxy since the end of the starburst (Leonardi & Rose (1996)). For J0339$``$3547 these ratios are 0.89 and 0.69 respectively. For the Leonardi & Rose model of a starburst lasting 0.3 Gy, this is indicative of a very strong starburst about 1 Gy after the end of the burst. This galaxy may represent an intermediate stage between the CNELG types and the dwarf spheroidal remnants proposed by Koo et al. (1995). By comparison, J0340$``$3510 has ratios of 1.12 and 0.97, and a composite spectrum of 60 normal early type galaxies from the survey has values of 1.10 and 0.95, both consistent with the Leonardi & Rose values for an old population.

## 4. Numbers of compact galaxies

To estimate the true numbers of compact galaxies from our sample we must first make a completeness correction. The color distributions in Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies show that the compact galaxies are all bluer than $`B_JR_F=1.6`$, so the best correction can be taken from the fraction of blue ($`B_JR_F<1.6`$) stellar objects observed; to $`B_J=19.7`$ we observed 31% of the blue stellar objects, so the corrected number of compact galaxies to this limit is $`7÷0.31=23\pm 9`$, equivalent to a surface density of $`7\pm 3\mathrm{deg}^2`$. The surface density to $`B_J=20.2`$ (completeness of 35%) is $`12\pm 3\mathrm{deg}^2`$.

We can use our observations of field galaxies to estimate the fraction of normal galaxies represented by the compact galaxies. At redshifts $`z>0.2`$, the H$`\alpha `$ line is shifted out of our 2dF spectra and our galaxy sample is less complete, so we define a “local” comparison field sample to be all galaxies in the field beyond the Fornax Cluster but at redshifts $`z<0.2`$. We successfully observed 992 resolved objects to $`B_J=19.7`$, of which 675 were “local” background galaxies: this is the minimum number of local field galaxies. There are $`1296992=304`$ resolved objects still to observe, so the maximum number of local field galaxies is $`675+304=979`$. The number of local ($`z<0.2`$) background galaxies to our limit is $`827\pm 152`$. The expected 23 compact galaxies among the stellar objects therefore constitute $`2.8\pm 1.6\%`$ of the local galaxy population. These would be missed by any surveys of objects classified by the APM as “galaxies” from UK Schmidt photographic data with $`16.5<B_J<19.7`$. These selection criteria are typical of previous surveys (Maddox et al. 1990b ; Colless (1998)).

This conclusion is for a magnitude, not volume, limited sample, but in fact the compact galaxies do occupy a similar volume of space to the general run of galaxies to this magnitude limit. For instance, the 2dF galaxy redshift survey, limited at a very similar $`B_J`$ to ours, has a mean redshift of 33000 km s<sup>-1</sup> (Colless (1998)), close to the mean of the compact galaxies. The galaxy catalog used for that survey has a mean surface density of 222$`\mathrm{deg}^2`$ at $`B_J<19.7`$ (M. Colless, private communication), for which the compact galaxies would represent an additional $`3.2\pm 1.2\%`$.

Only about half of the local galaxy sample exhibits significant emission line features, so the new compact galaxies constitute a larger fraction of emission line galaxies (3–5%). They contribute an even larger fraction of strong H$`\alpha `$ emitters with $`EW(\mathrm{H}\alpha )>40`$ Å, so may make a small but measurable contribution to the local star formation rate.

The new compact galaxies have very similar absolute magnitudes, sizes and (in most cases) emission line properties to the Koo et al. (1994,1995) CNELGs. The distributions shown in Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies suggest that they are a continuation of the CNELGs to lower redshifts and brighter apparent magnitudes. A better way to compare these populations is by the volume density. Koo et al. (1994) derive a CNELG density of $`7.5\times 10^5`$$`\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$ compared to the value of $`17\times 10^5`$$`\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$ for local HIIH plus DHIIH galaxies (Salzer et al. 1989). For our sample of compact galaxies, using the $`1/V_{max}`$ method we obtain a similar value of $`(13\pm 4)\times 10^5`$$`\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$. These results are consistent with the respective galaxy populations being related, but we prefer not to draw any conclusions until we can analyze the compact galaxies in the context of our complete sample.

We thank our referee for detailed suggestions which greatly improved the presentation of this work. We also thank Dr. Lewis Jones for helpful discussions and Dr. Jesus Gallego for providing data for Figure The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: The Number of Unresolved Compact Galaxies. SP acknowledges the support of the Royal Society via a University Research Fellowship. JBJ is supported by the UK PPARC. Part of this work was done at the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under contract No. W-7405-Eng-48.