{"work":{"id":"22e1c468-548b-4f4f-b41a-2a07b62c9c0c","openalex_id":null,"doi":null,"arxiv_id":"1003.4747","raw_key":null,"title":"Mass and environment as drivers of galaxy evolution in SDSS and zCOSMOS and the origin of the Schechter function","authors":null,"authors_text":null,"year":2010,"venue":"astro-ph.CO","abstract":"We explore the inter-relationships between mass, star-formation rate and environment in the SDSS, zCOSMOS and other surveys. The differential effects of mass and environment are completely separable to z ~ 1, indicating that two distinct processes are operating, \"mass-quenching\" and \"environment-quenching\". Environment-quenching, at fixed over-density, evidently does not change with epoch to z ~ 1, suggesting that it occurs as large-scale structure develops in the Universe. The observed constancy of the mass-function shape for star-forming galaxies, demands that the mass-quenching of galaxies around and above M*, must be proportional to their star-formation rates at all z < 2. We postulate that this simple mass-quenching law also holds over a much broader range of stellar mass and epoch. These two simple quenching processes, plus some additional quenching due to merging, then naturally produce (a) a quasi-static Schechter mass function for star-forming galaxies with a value of M* that is set by the proportionality between the star-formation and mass-quenching rates, (b) a double Schechter function for passive galaxies with two components: the dominant one is produced by mass-quenching and has exactly the same M* as the star-forming galaxies but an alpha shallower by +1, while the other is produced by environment effects and has the same M* and alpha as the star-forming galaxies, and is larger in high density environments. Subsequent merging of quenched galaxies modifies these predictions somewhat in the denser environments, slightly increasing M* and making alpha more negative. All of these detailed quantitative relationships between the Schechter parameters are indeed seen in the SDSS, lending strong support to our simple empirically-based model. The model naturally produces for passive galaxies the \"anti-hierarchical\" run of mean ages and alpha-element abundances with mass.","external_url":"https://arxiv.org/abs/1003.4747","cited_by_count":null,"metadata_source":"pith","metadata_fetched_at":"2026-07-03T09:57:55.188793+00:00","pith_arxiv_id":"1003.4747","created_at":"2026-05-14T17:47:31.902911+00:00","updated_at":"2026-07-03T09:57:55.188793+00:00","title_quality_ok":true,"display_title":"Mass and environment as drivers of galaxy evolution in SDSS and zCOSMOS and the origin of the Schechter function","render_title":"Mass and environment as drivers of galaxy evolution in SDSS and zCOSMOS and the origin of the Schechter function"},"hub":{"state":{"work_id":"22e1c468-548b-4f4f-b41a-2a07b62c9c0c","tier":"hub","tier_reason":"10+ Pith inbound or 1,000+ external citations","pith_inbound_count":14,"external_cited_by_count":null,"distinct_field_count":3,"first_pith_cited_at":"2026-05-12T18:00:01+00:00","last_pith_cited_at":"2026-07-02T13:34:37+00:00","author_build_status":"not_needed","summary_status":"needed","contexts_status":"needed","graph_status":"needed","ask_index_status":"not_needed","reader_status":"not_needed","recognition_status":"not_needed","updated_at":"2026-08-05T02:34:31.099313+00:00","tier_text":"hub"},"tier":"hub","role_counts":[{"context_role":"method","n":1}],"polarity_counts":[{"context_polarity":"use_method","n":1}],"runs":{},"summary":{},"graph":{},"authors":[]}}