Old Stellar Populations of The VGS Void Galaxies

Cosmic voids form an essential ingredient of the Cosmic Web and may harbour a systematically different population of galaxies. Largely unaffected by the complex processes modifying galaxies in high-density environments, the pristine and isolated void regions must hold important clues to the intrinsic process of formation and evolution of galaxies. The Void Galaxy Survey (VGS) is a multi-wavelength program to study 60 void galaxies. Each has been selected from the deepest interior regions of identified voids in the SDSS redshift survey on the basis of a unique geometric technique, with no a prior selection of intrinsic properties of the void galaxies. The project intends to study in detail the gas content, star formation history and stellar content, as well as kinematics and dynamics of void galaxies and their companions in a broad sample of void environments. It involves the HI imaging of the gas distribution in each of the VGS galaxies. Amongst its most tantalizing findings is the possible evidence for cold gas accretion in some of the most interesting objects, amongst which are a polar ring galaxy and a filamentary configuration of void galaxies. An essential aspect for understanding the formation and evolution of void galaxies concerns their star formation history. The current IRAC proposal is meant to study the older stellar population of void galaxies to constrain their assembly history