Looking for a Relationship between Star Formation and Turbulence in THINGS Galaxies

We have examined the relationship between star formation and turbulence in a sample of 11 galaxies from The HI Nearby Galaxy Survey (THINGS). The sample contains one dwarf irregular galaxy and 10 spiral galaxies. To analyze a potential relationship, we trace the turbulent motions in the HI gas maps from THINGS and the star formation rates in far-ultraviolet (FUV) images from the NASA Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) and construct radial profiles and pixel-by-pixel plots of certain parameters. We used radial profiles to remove the underlying disk from the pixel-pixel plots. The parameters include star formation rate density (SFRD), kinetic energy density (KED), velocity dispersion (V_disp), and mass surface density (𝛴_HI). These plots give us a broad idea of what the relationships between SFRD and KED, V_disp, and 𝛴_HI look like. We find that there is, at best, a weak correlation between star formation and turbulence, which suggests that star formation is not a major driver of turbulence in atomic gas on the spatial scales of our survey. Additionally, we find that the relationships between these parameters are comparable in dwarfs and spirals suggesting that similar mechanisms are at play in both types of galaxies. This work was funded by NSF grants #1852478 and #1950901 to Northern Arizona University for its REU program.