CO Multi-line Imaging of Nearby Galaxies (COMING) IV. Overview of the
  Project
  Observations of the molecular gas in galaxies are vital to understanding the
evolution and star-forming histories of galaxies. However, galaxies with
molecular gas maps of their whole discs having sufficient resolution to
distinguish galactic structures are severely lacking. Millimeter wavelength
studies at a high angular resolution across multiple lines and transitions are
particularly needed, severely limiting our ability to infer the universal
properties of molecular gas in galaxies. Hence, we conducted a legacy project
with the 45 m telescope of the Nobeyama Radio Observatory, called the CO
Multi-line Imaging of Nearby Galaxies (COMING), which simultaneously observed
147 galaxies with high far-infrared flux in $^{12}$CO, $^{13}$CO, and C$^{18}$O
$J=1-0$ lines. The total molecular gas mass was derived using the standard
CO-to-H$_2$ conversion factor and found to be positively correlated with the
total stellar mass derived from the WISE $3.4 \mu$m band data. The fraction of
the total molecular gas mass to the total stellar mass in galaxies does not
depend on their Hubble types nor the existence of a galactic bar, although when
galaxies in individual morphological types are investigated separately, the
fraction seems to decrease with the total stellar mass in early-type galaxies
and vice versa in late-type galaxies. No differences in the distribution of the
total molecular gas mass, stellar mass, and the total molecular gas to stellar
mass ratio was observed between barred and non-barred galaxies, which is likely
the result of our sample selection criteria, in that we prioritized observing
FIR bright (and thus molecular gas-rich) galaxies.
