The Astronomical Journal, 127:3235–3272, 2004 June A # 2004. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved. Printed in U.S.A. AN IRAS HIGH RESOLUTION IMAGE RESTORATION (HIRES) ATLAS OF ALL INTERACTING GALAXIES IN THE IRAS REVISED BRIGHT GALAXY SAMPLE Jason A. Surace Spitzer Science Center, MS 220–6, California Institute of Technology, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA 91125; [email protected] D. B. Sanders University of Hawaii, Institute for Astronomy, 2680 Woodlawn Drive, Honolulu, HI 96822; [email protected] and Joseph M. Mazzarella Infrared Processing and Analysis Center, MS 100–22, California Institute of Technology, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA 91125; [email protected] Received 2003 September 2; accepted 2004 February 19 ABSTRACT The importance of far-infrared observations for our understanding of extreme activity in interacting and merging galaxies has been illustrated by many studies. Even though two decades have passed since its launch, the most complete all-sky survey to date from which far-IR selected galaxy samples can be chosen is still that of the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS). However, the spatial resolution of the IRAS all-sky survey is in- sufficient to resolve the emission from individual galaxies in most interacting galaxy pairs, and hence previous studies of their far-IR properties have had to concentrate either on global system properties or on the properties of very widely separated and weakly interacting pairs. Using the HIRES image reconstruction technique, it is possible to achieve a spatial resolution ranging from 3000 to 1A5 (depending on wavelength and detector cov- erage), which is a fourfold improvement over the normal resolution of IRAS. This is sufficient to resolve the far- IR emission from the individual galaxies in many interacting systems detected by IRAS, which is very important for meaningful comparisons with single, isolated galaxies. We present high-resolution 12, 25, 60, and 100 m images of 106 interacting galaxy systems contained in the IRAS Revised Bright Galaxy Sample (RBGS, Sanders et al.), a complete sample of all galaxies having a 60 m flux density greater than 5.24 Jy. These systems were selected to have at least two distinguishable galaxies separated by less than three average galactic diameters, and thus we have excluded very widely separated systems and very advanced mergers. Additionally, some systems have been included that are more than three galactic diameters apart, yet have separations less than 40 and are thus likely to suffer from confusion in the RBGS. The new complete survey has the same properties as the prototype survey of Surace et al. We find no increased tendency for infrared-bright galaxies to be associated with other infrared-bright galaxies among the widely separated pairs studied here. We find small enhancements in far-IR activity in multiple galaxy systems relative to RBGS noninteracting galaxies with the same blue luminosity distribution. We also find no differences in infrared activity (as measured by infrared color and luminosity) between late- and early-type spiral galaxies. Key words: atlases — galaxies: interactions — infrared: galaxies — infrared: general — techniques: image processing On-line material: machine-readable table 1. INTRODUCTION references therein). The young OB stars that dominate the starburst radiate primarily in the optical and ultraviolet, but In the last two decades it has become apparent that inter- surrounding gas and dust reprocesses this radiation and thus actions between galaxies can play a significant role in their strongly radiates at thermal wavelengths in the far-infrared. evolution. From the early dynamical simulations of Toomre & Far-IR luminosity is thus indicative of the magnitude of recent Toomre (1972) to more modern work by Barnes, Hernquist, star formation activity (Telesco 1988; Lonsdale et al. 1984). In and others (Barnes & Hernquist 1992, and references therein), addition, because of the increased temperature of the heated it has become apparent that interactions and mergers between dust, we expect the far-IR colors to be a good diagnostic of galaxies can radically alter their morphology by inducing enhanced star formation. Therefore, many studies have con- shells, bars, tails, and other tidal features. Perhaps more centrated on the far-IR properties of interacting galaxies. importantly, cancellation of angular momentum during the Several studies have also discussed the incidence of mul- merger process can lead to a radical redistribution of the gas tiple bright galaxies being found within a given interacting content of the galaxies, with very rapid gas inflow into the galaxy system. Haynes & Herter (1988) found that for galaxy galaxy cores. This supply of fresh material could possibly fuel pairs separated by 20 –100, approximately 10% have multiple an active galactic nucleus or provide the high gas densities components brighter than 0.5 Jy at 60 mand1Jyat100m. needed to lead to a sudden burst of star formation. Xu & Sulentic (1991) also concluded that in the majority of There is considerable evidence that enhanced star formation interacting systems, only one galaxy is infrared bright. These is associated with interacting galaxies (Sulentic 1988, and results agree with earlier work by Joseph et al. (1984), which 3235 3236 SURACE, SANDERS, & MAZZARELLA concluded, based on near-IR colors, that usually only one properties of the catalog and some results derived from galaxy in a pair showed signs of unusual activity. This is an them. Appendix A presents additional notes for selected gal- interesting result, because it suggests that specific properties axy systems. Finally, in Appendix B we include data for of the interacting galaxies may determine whether or not they galaxy systems that were originally included in the Bright become emitters in the far-IR as well. Testing this hypothesis Galaxy Sample (BGS) but were subsequently dropped from requires resolution of the individual galaxies in the far-IR, the Revised Bright Galaxy Sample (RBGS) after a reanalysis which is the goal of this IRAS study. of their fluxes. These objects are provided for the interest of the The canonical figure used by many authors to delineate reader but do not bear on the analysis of the catalog. interacting versus noninteracting systems is a projected sep- aration of three average galactic diameters, as presumably 2. DATA galaxies this close to one another are also close enough to 2.1. Sample exert a considerable gravitational effect (Dahari 1984; Byrd et al. 1987; Surace et al. 1993). However, for most galaxies All of the targets were selected from the IRAS RBGS detected by IRAS, this typically corresponds to an angular (Sanders et al. 2003). The RBGS consists of all 629 galaxies separation of a few arcminutes, which is less than the reso- detected by IRAS with a 60 m flux density greater than 5.24 Jy lution normally achieved by IRAS using the one-dimensional and thus is similar to and includes all of the well-studied BGS coadder ADDSCAN or the two-dimensional FRESCO imag- (Soifer et al. 1989), but extends coverage to the entire sky at ing process. As a result, it has been impossible to study the Galactic latitudes jbj > 5. far-IR properties of the individual galaxies, and most studies The following criterion was applied in order to select close have either made assumptions about the distribution of flux pairs from the RBGS: between galaxies within the interacting system (Bushouse 2S 1986) or have concentrated on widely separated pairs (Haynes 12 3; ð1Þ & Herter 1988; Xu & Sulentic 1991). Since previous studies D1 þ D2 of very widely separated galaxy pairs indicate that in a sub- stantial fraction of interacting systems only one galaxy is where S12 is the distance between galaxy centers and D1 and unusually active in the far-IR (Xu & Sulentic 1991), it is D2 are their optical diameters, as measured from the Palomar necessary to resolve these galaxies in order to properly study Sky Survey. This criterion therefore selects all systems in those properties such as morphology that are unique to the which the galaxies are separated by less than three times their individual galaxies. Additionally, Xu & Sulentic (1991) found average diameter. Note that this excludes very advanced evidence that at smaller separations (and hence greater inter- mergers such as Arp 220 in which the individual galactic disks action strengths), there was a greater enhancement of far-IR can no longer be distinguished. This also has the additional activity. Therefore it would be valuable if these studies could benefit of selecting systems that are sufficiently separated as to be extended to smaller separations for which more observable be resolvable with HIRES. As such, the sample includes all of changes are taking place. the galaxies listed in Table 1 of Surace et al. (1993). Addi- Development of the maximum correlation method algo- tionally, in an attempt to resolve sources listed in the RBGS rithm (MCM; Aumann et al. 1990) for use in IRAS image that were likely to be confused because of small separations, reconstruction significantly increased the resolution of IRAS we included all small galaxy pairs with apparent separation 0 observations. As implemented in the HIRES process, MCM is less than 4 . This separation was determined by the normal 0 an iterative image reconstruction technique that involves using survey resolution of 4 , which in turn is set by the IRAS 100 m the known response functions of the IRAS detectors to scan detector size. simulated image estimates, which are then compared to the 2.2. Data Reduction actual detector data. In this way, a high-resolution image es- timate is formed. The result is typically a fivefold increase in The IRAS data were processed in a manner similar to Surace resolution, varying from roughly 3000 ; 4500 at 12 mto et al. (1993). The raw detector scans were initially extracted 7200 ; 13000 at 100 m, with the actual achieved resolution from the IRAS database using the SNIPSCAN process.