Publication Date
1999
Journal or Book Title
Third Stromlo Symposium: The Galactic Halo
Abstract
We introduce a new galaxy image decomposition tool, GALPHAT (GALaxy PHotometric ATtributes), to provide full posterior probability distributions and reliable confidence intervals for all model parameters. GALPHAT is designed to yield a high speed and accurate likelihood computation, using grid interpolation and Fourier rotation. We benchmark this approach using an ensemble of simulated Sersic model galaxies over a wide range of observational conditions: the signal-to-noise ratio S/N, the ratio of galaxy size to the PSF and the image size, and errors in the assumed PSF; and a range of structural parameters: the half-light radius $r_e$ and the Sersic index $n$. We characterise the strength of parameter covariance in Sersic model, which increases with S/N and $n$, and the results strongly motivate the need for the full posterior probability distribution in galaxy morphology analyses and later inferences. The test results for simulated galaxies successfully demonstrate that, with a careful choice of Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms and fast model image generation, GALPHAT is a powerful analysis tool for reliably inferring morphological parameters from a large ensemble of galaxies over a wide range of different observational conditions. (abridged)
Pages
100-112
Volume
165
Book Series Title
Astronomical Society of the Pacific Conference Series
Recommended Citation
Weinberg, Martin D., "Effect of the Magellanic Clouds on the Milky Way disk and VICE VERSA" (1999). Third Stromlo Symposium: The Galactic Halo. 112.
Retrieved from https://scholarworks.umass.edu/astro_faculty_pubs/112
Comments
This is a pre-published version which is collected from arXiv link. The published version is at http://www.aspbooks.org/a/volumes/article_details/?paper_id=17091