Anatomy of the star formation in a tidally disturbed disk galaxy: NGC 3718

Abstract

We present a UV, optical, and near-IR study of the star-forming complexes in the nearby peculiar galaxy NGC 3718, using Ultraviolet Imaging telescope, Galaxy Evolution Explorer, Spitzer, and DECam Legacy Survey imaging data. The galaxy has a disturbed optical morphology owing to the multiple tidal arms, the warped disk, and the prominent curved dust lanes, but in the near-IR it appears to be a bulge-dominated galaxy. Its disturbed morphology makes it an excellent case to study star formation in a tidally disturbed galaxy that may have undergone a recent minor merger. To study the distribution and properties of the star-forming clumps (SFCs), we divided the galaxy within the R25 (B band) radius into three parts—the upper, central, and lower regions. Using the UV band images, we investigated the warped star-forming disk, the extended tidal arms, and the distribution and sizes of the 182 SFCs. Their distribution is 49, 60, and 73 in the galaxy's upper, central, and lower regions, respectively. We determined the UV color, star formation rates (SFRs), star formation density (ΣSFR), and ages of the SFCs. The central disk of the galaxy has a larger mean ΣSFR that is ∼3.3 and ∼1.6 times higher than the upper and lower regions, respectively. We also find that the SFCs in the central disk are older than those in the tidal arms. Our study thus shows that minor mergers can trigger the inside-out growth of galaxy disks, where the younger SFCs are in outer tidal arms and not in the inner disk.