The recent star formation histories of nearby galaxies on resolved scales

Abstract

Star formation histories (SFHs) of galaxies are affected by a variety of factors, both external (field versus cluster/group) and internal [presence of a bar and active galactic nucleus (AGN), morphological type]. In this work, we extend our previous study and apply the SFR5SFR200 metric to a sample of 11 nearby galaxies with Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer observations. Based on a combination of H α and ultraviolet photometry, SFR5SFR200 is sensitive to star formation time-scales of ∼5–200 Myr and therefore measures the present-day rate of change in the star formation rate (SFR), dSFR/dt. Within this limited galaxy sample, we do not observe systematic variations between the global value of SFR5SFR200 and the presence of an AGN, stellar bar, or group or cluster membership. Within some of the individual galaxies, we, however, observe significant differences in SFR5SFR200 between the arm and interarm regions. In half of the galaxies, the recent SFH of both arm and interarm regions has been very similar. However, in the galaxies with higher bulge-to-total light ratios and earlier morphological type, the SFR is declining more rapidly in the interarm regions. This decline in SFR is not a result of low molecular gas surface density or a decrease in the star formation efficiency, implying that other factors are responsible for this SFR decrease.