J-PLUS: Spectroscopic validation of Hα emission line maps in spatially resolved galaxies

¹ Centro de Estudios de Física del Cosmos de Aragón (CEFCA), Plaza San Juan 1, 44001 Teruel, Spain
² Departamento de Física, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, Edifício C8, Campo Grande, 1749-016 Lisbon, Portugal
³ BNP Paribas Corporate & Institutional Banking, Torre Ocidente Rua Galileu Galilei, 1500-392 Lisbon, Portugal
⁴ Instituto de Física, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Av. Bento Goncalves, 9500 Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil
⁵ Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía, CSIC, Apt 3004, 18080 Granada, Spain
⁶ Observatório Nacional - MCTI (ON), Rua Gal. José Cristino 77, São Cristóvão, 20921-400 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
⁷ Donostia International Physics Centre (DIPC), Paseo Manuel de Lardizabal 4, 20018 Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain
⁸ IKERBASQUE, Basque Foundation for Science, 48013, Bilbao, Spain
⁹ University of Michigan, Department of Astronomy, 1085 South University Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
¹⁰ University of Alabama, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Gallalee Hall, Tuscaloosa, AL 35401, USA
¹¹ Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, La Laguna, 38205, Tenerife, Spain
¹² Departamento de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, 38206, Tenerife, Spain
¹³ Instituto de Astronomia, Geofísica e Ciências Atmosféricas, Universidade de São Paulo, 05508-090 São Paulo, Brazil

^★ Corresponding author; rahna.payyasseri@gmail.com

Received: 30 December 2024
Accepted: 6 February 2025

Abstract

Aims. We present a dedicated automated pipeline to construct spatially resolved emission Hα+[NII] maps and to derive the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) in 12 optical filters (five broad and seven narrow and medium) of Hα emission line regions in nearby galaxies (z < 0.0165) observed by the Javalambre Photometric Local Universe Survey (J-PLUS).

Methods. We used the J0660 filter of 140 Å width centered at 6600 Å to trace H α + [NII] emission, and r and i broad bands were used to estimate the stellar continuum. We created pure emission line images after the continnum subtraction, where the Hα emission line regions were detected. This method was also applied to integral field unit (IFU) spectroscopic data from PHANGS-MUSE, CALIFA, and MaNGA surveys by building synthetic narrow bands based on J-PLUS filters. The studied sample includes the cross-matched catalog of these IFU surveys with the J-PLUS third data release (DR3), amounting to two PHANGS-MUSE, 78 CALIFA, and 78 MaNGA galaxies at z < 0.0165, respectively.

Results. We compared the Hα+[NII] radial profiles from J-PLUS and the IFU surveys, finding good agreement within the expected uncertainties. We also compared the SEDs from the emission line regions detected in J-PLUS images, reproducing the main spectral features present in the spectroscopic data. Finally, we compared the emission fluxes from the J-PLUS and IFU surveys accounting for scale differences, finding a difference of only 2% with a dispersion of 7% in the measurements.

Conclusions. The J-PLUS data provide reliable spatially resolved Hα+[NII] emission maps for nearby galaxies. We provide the J-PLUS DR3 catalog for the 158 galaxies with IFU data, including emission maps, SEDs of star-forming clumps, and radial profiles.