Why Post-starburst Galaxies Are Now Quiescent

Post-starburst or "E + A" galaxies are rapidly transitioning from star-forming to quiescence. While the current star formation rate (SFR) of post-starbursts is already at the level of early-type galaxies, we recently discovered that many have large CO-traced molecular gas reservoirs consistent with normal star-forming galaxies. These observations raise the question of why these galaxies have such low SFRs. Here we present an ALMA search for the denser gas traced by HCN (1-0) and HCO+ (1-0) in two CO-luminous, quiescent post-starburst galaxies. Intriguingly, we fail to detect either molecule. The upper limits are consistent with the low SFRs and with earlytype galaxies. The HCN/CO luminosity ratio upper limits are low compared to star-forming and even many earlytype galaxies. This implied low dense gas mass fraction explains the low SFRs relative to the CO-traced molecular gas and suggests that the state of the gas in post-starburst galaxies is unusual, with some mechanism inhibiting its collapse to denser states. We conclude that post-starbursts galaxies are now quiescent because little dense gas is available, in contrast to the significant CO-traced lower density gas reservoirs that still remain.Hubble Fellowship Grant [HST-HF2-51391.001-A]; Space Telescope Science Institute; NASA [NAS5-26555, ADP-NNX10AE88G]; NSF [AST-1724864, AST-1715206]; HST [AR-13906, 15043]; National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program [DGE 1256260]; Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; National Science Foundation; U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science; Participating InstitutionsThis item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at repository@u.library.arizona.edu