Double-peaked narrow emission-line galaxies from the sloan digital sky survey. I. Sample and basic properties

Abstract

Recently, much attention has been paid to double-peaked narrow emission-line (NEL) galaxies, some of which are suggested to be related to merging galaxies. We make a systematic search to build the largest sample of these sources from Data Release 7 of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). With reasonable criteria for fluxes, FWHMs of the emission lines, and separations of the peaks, we select 3030 double-peaked NEL galaxies. In light of the existence of broad Balmer lines and the locations of the two components of double-peaked NELs distinguished by the Kauffmann etal. criteria in the Baldwin-Phillips- Terlevich diagram, we find that there are 81 TypeI active galactic nuclei (AGNs), 837 double TypeII AGNs (2-TypeII), 708 galaxies with double star-forming components (2-SF), 400 with mixed star-forming and TypeII AGN components (TypeII + SF), and 1004 unknown-type objects. As a by-product, a sample of galaxies (12,582) with asymmetric or top-flat profiles of emission lines is established. After visually inspecting the SDSS images of the two samples, we find 54 galaxies with dual cores. The present samples can be used to study the dynamics of merging galaxies, the triggering mechanism of black hole activity, the hierarchical growth of galaxies, and the dynamics of narrow line regions driven by outflows and a rotating disk. © © 2012. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.