Galaxy Evolution Drivers: Improving Analysis Tools

• Grant number: 25/06495-9
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: September 01, 2025
• End date: August 31, 2028
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Astronomy - Extragalactic Astrophysics
• Principal Investigator: Lucimara Pires Martins
• Grantee: Lucimara Pires Martins
• Host Institution: Pró-Reitoria de Pós-Graduação, Pesquisa e Extensão. Universidade Cidade de São Paulo (UNICID). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The nearby universe presents a diversity of galaxies, result of theevolution of these systems over more than ten billion years. In the next decades, our capacity of observing distant galaxies to directly study their evolutionwill dramatically increase, with the advent of the extremely large telescopes. It is of paramount importance to have the appropriated tools to analyze this data when they arrive. A method widely used to analyze the integrated spectrum of galaxies is the spectral fitting technique, based on modeling the galaxy spectra with a combination of simple stellar population models. Despite being a powerful tool, the synthesis of stellar population models involves many assumptions and uncertainties. We propose here a long term project to explore the uncertainties and limitations of thespectral fitting technique using the state of the art models available today, and based on that, improve these uncertaintes and limitations, in preparation for the diversity of data which is to come. Most of this project is built upon two successful HST proposals (one archive and one observational) and two ongoing international collaborations, the POPSYCLE and XShootU. (AU)