{
  "id": "1302.0768",
  "version": "v1",
  "published": "2013-02-04T17:45:08.000Z",
  "updated": "2013-02-04T17:45:08.000Z",
  "title": "The K-band luminosity functions of super star clusters in luminous infrared galaxies, their slopes, and the effects of blending",
  "authors": [
    "Zara Randriamanakoto",
    "Petri Vaisanen",
    "Stuart Ryder",
    "Erkki Kankare",
    "Jari Kotilainen",
    "Seppo Mattila"
  ],
  "comment": "18 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS",
  "categories": [
    "astro-ph.CO"
  ],
  "abstract": "Super star clusters (SSCs) are typically found in interacting galaxies and trace an extreme form of star-formation. We present a K-band study of SSC candidates in a sample of local luminous infrared galaxies (LIRGs) using two adaptive optics instruments (VLT/NACO and Gemini/ALTAIR/NIRI). In addition to facilitating SSC detections in obscured environments, this work introduces SSC studies in hosts with higher star-formation rates (SFRs) than most previous studies. We find that the luminosity functions (LFs) of the clusters are reasonably well-fitted by a single power-law with the values of the index \\alpha ranging between 1.5 to 2.4 with an average value of \\alpha ~ 1.9. This value appears to be less steep than the average \\alpha ~ 2.2 in normal spiral galaxies. Due to the host galaxy distances involved (median $D_L$ ~ 70 Mpc) blending effects have to be taken into account, and are investigated using Monte Carlo simulations of blending effects for LFs and a photometric SSC analysis of the well-studied Antennae system which is artificially redshifted to distances of our sample. While blending tends to flatten LFs our analyses show that \\Delta \\alpha is less than ~ 0.1 in our sample. The simulations also show that in the luminosity range, $M_K < -13$, considered in this work the extracted SSC luminosities are generally dominated by a single dominant star cluster rather than several knots of SF. We present resolution- and distance-dependent SSC surface density confusion limits and show how blending rates and aperture sizes affect the LFs. The smallest possible apertures should be used in crowded regions.",
  "revisions": [
    {
      "version": "v1",
      "updated": "2013-02-04T17:45:08.000Z"
    }
  ],
  "analyses": {
    "keywords": [
      "super star clusters",
      "luminous infrared galaxies",
      "k-band luminosity functions",
      "ssc surface density confusion",
      "surface density confusion limits"
    ],
    "tags": [
      "journal article"
    ],
    "publication": {
      "doi": "10.1093/mnras/stt185",
      "journal": "Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society",
      "year": 2013,
      "month": "May",
      "volume": 431,
      "number": 1,
      "pages": 554
    },
    "note": {
      "typesetting": "TeX",
      "pages": 18,
      "language": "en",
      "license": "arXiv",
      "status": "editable",
      "inspire": 1217524,
      "adsabs": "2013MNRAS.431..554R"
    }
  }
}