Special Seminar

Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA, part of the fourth incarnation of the Sloan Digital Sky Surveys or SDSS-IV), is a new survey which will obtain spatially resolved spectral maps for 10,000 nearby galaxies selected from the SDSS Main Galaxy Sample.  These data will unwrap the layers of local galaxies - revealing their stellar and gas dynamics, as well as the ages and chemical make-up of their constituent stars, and locations of current star formation. MaNGA uses the existing SDSS-III BOSS spectrograph, covering the wavelength range 3600-10,000A (with a velocity resolution of ~60 km/s), but grouping the individual 2" fibres into 17 hexagonal bundles of up to 127 fibres each. The bundles range in angular size from 12-33" diameter, with a typical spatial resolution of 1 kpc at the redshift of the MaNGA sample which is selected to provide a uniform sampling of galaxies with stellar masses 10⁹-10¹² Msun.  MaNGA began observations on the Sloan Telescope at APO in July 2014 and will observe ~1600 galaxies/year for the next six years. I will give a general overview of the project and why I'm excited to be part of it.