Bibcode
Pflamm-Altenburg, Jan; Weidner, Carsten; Kroupa, Pavel
Bibliographical reference
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 395, Issue 1, pp. 394-400.
Advertised on:
5
2009
Citations
108
Refereed citations
91
Description
Although the stellar initial mass function (IMF) has only been directly
determined in star clusters, it has been manifoldly applied on
galaxy-wide scales. But taking the clustered nature of star formation
into account the galaxy-wide IMF is constructed by adding all IMFs of
all young star clusters leading to an integrated galactic initial mass
function (IGIMF). The IGIMF is top-light compared to the canonical IMF
in star clusters and steepens with decreasing total star formation rate
(SFR). This discrepancy is marginal for large disc galaxies but becomes
significant for Small Magellanic Cloud type galaxies and less massive
ones. We here construct IGIMF-based relations between the total far- and
near-ultraviolet luminosities of galaxies and the underlying SFR. We
make the prediction that the Hα luminosity of star-forming dwarf
galaxies decreases faster with decreasing SFR than the ultraviolet (UV)
luminosity. This turn-down of the Hα/UV-flux ratio should be
evident below total SFRs of
10-2Msolaryr-1.