GALAXY EVOLUTION GROUP @ CAB

The Galaxy Formation and Evolution Group at Centro de Astrobiología aims at providing a global view of the processes of galaxy formation and evolution across cosmic time. The research interests and expertise of the group members cover a wide range of topics that are generally attacked observationally with a multiwavelength approach. The group routinely collects, analyzes, and publishes astronomical data from radio and millimetric to infrared, optical and X-rays, making use of state-of-the-art ground- and space-based facilities. The deep expertise of group members across the electromagnetic spectrum enables us to attack observationally, and to interpret theoretically, a very broad range of physical phenomena and their interaction: interacting/merging galaxies, superwinds and feedback, gas outflows from millimteric and infrared to optical and X-rays, as well as the nuclear activity and its relation with the overall host properties.

The scientific research carried out at CAB covers most of the relevant aspects of galaxy formation and evolution. The group has a great expertise in observational studies of massive star-formation in both nearby and distant luminous star-forming galaxies using, for instance, the Lyman alpha emission as a tracer of star formation processes. Integral-field spectroscopy of luminous and ultra-luminous infrared galaxies in the near infrared is routinely used to differentiate the different ionization mechanisms of the interstellar medium (supernovae, young stars, Active Galactic Nuclei …) over a very broad range of luminosities and to characterize the galaxy properties. Neutral and ionized gas outflows, their kinematics, their effect on the star-formation rate and thus on the overall galaxy evolution, are also obsevationally studied in the optical and infrared.