The relation between galaxy morphology and colour in the EAGLE simulation

We investigate the relation between kinematic morphology, intrinsic colour and stellar mass of galaxies in the EAGLE cosmological hydrodynamical simulation. We calculate the intrinsic u - r colours and measure the fraction of kinetic energy invested in ordered corotation of 3562 galaxies at z = 0 with stellar masses larger than 10¹⁰ M_⊙. Inspection of gri-composite images suggests that the kinematic morphology is a useful proxy for visual morphology. EAGLE produces a galaxy population for which morphology is tightly correlated with the location in the colour-mass diagram, with the red sequence mostly populated by elliptical galaxies and the blue cloud by disc galaxies. Satellite galaxies are more likely to be on the red sequence than centrals, and for satellites the red sequence is morphologically more diverse. These results show that the connection between mass, intrinsic colour and morphology arises from galaxy-formation models that reproduce the observed galaxy mass function and sizes.