Abstract
We consider the roles of two widely invoked mechanisms for the metallicity — luminosity correlation among late — type galaxies: higher astration level and decreasing efficiency of heavy — element loss with increasing luminosity. We find that both mechanisms contribute about equally to the range in oxygen abundance between low (log L B ~ 8) and high (log L B ~ 10.5) luminosity galaxies. We also consider the transition from spirals to irregulars, finding that both the oxygen abundance deficiency (indicating the degree of mass exchange between a galaxy and its environment) and the gas fraction vary smoothly along the sequence. Thus we find no ‘irregular versus spiral dichotomy’.KeywordsGalaxiesabundances — Galaxiesevolution — GalaxiesISM
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