The nature, environments, and origin of post-starburst galaxies at [zeta] [less than or equal to] 0.6

Abstract

Post-starburst galaxies represent a transitional stage between star-forming and quiescent galaxies and thus studying their nature, environments and origin mechanisms is fundamental to understanding galaxy evolution. In this thesis, we select a sample of 48 post-starburst galaxies from SHELS F2 spectroscopic sample using the width of Hδ absorption line combined with visual inspection. We construct galaxy stellar mass density field for the mass-limited SHELS F2 sample within 0.2 < ζ < 0.55 to investigate the environments of post-starburst galaxies with respect to general galaxy population. We find that similar fractions of post-starburst galaxies reside in underdense, average dense and overdense regions, i.e., that these galaxies do not prefer special environments. Based on HSC ι− band images, we find that ram-pressure stripping, if present, is not strong enough to disturb the morphology of stellar light in cluster post-starburst galaxies and that merger/galaxy interactions drive the formation of post-starburst galaxies in average dense and underdense regions.