Far-Infrared Properties of Blue Compact Dwarf Galaxies Observed with AKARI/Far-Infrared Surveyor (FIS)

Abstract

We report basic far-infrared (FIR) properties of eight blue compact dwarf galaxies (BCDs) observed by AKARI. We measure the fluxes at the four FIS bands (wavelengths of 65 µm, 90 µm, 140 µm, and 160 µm). Based on these fluxes, we estimate basic quantities about dust: dust temperature, dust mass, and total FIR luminosity. We find that the typical dust temperature of the BCD sample is systematically higher than that of normal spiral galaxies, although there is a large variety. The interstellar radiation field estimated from the dust temperature ranges up to 100 times of the Galactic value. This confirms the concentrated star-forming activity in BCDs. The star formation rate can be evaluated from the FIR luminosity as 0.01-0.5 M ⊙ yr −1 . Combining this quantity with gas mass taken from the literature, we estimate the gas consumption timescales (gas mass divided by the star formation rate), which prove to span a wide range from 1 Gyr to 100 Gyr. A natural interpretation of this large variety can be provided by intermittent star formation activity. We finally show the relation between dust-to-gas ratio and metallicity (we utilize our estimate of dust mass, and take other necessary quantities from the literature). There is a positive correlation between dust-to-gas ratio and metallicity as expected from chemical evolution models.