The Physical Nature of Lyman Alpha Emitting Galaxies at z=3.1

By E. Gawiser, P. V. van Dokkum, C. Gronwall, R. Ciardullo, G. Blanc, Francisco J. Castander, J. Feldmeier, H. Francke, M. Franx, L. Haberzettl and 13 more. 2006

182 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We selected 40 candidate Lyman Alpha Emitting galaxies (LAEs) at z ~=3.1 with observed frame equivalent widths>150A and inferred emission line fluxes>2.5x10^-17 ergs/cm^2/s from deep narrow-band and broad-band MUSYC images of the Extended Chandra Deep Field South. Covering 992 sq. arcmin, this is the largest ``blank field'' surveyed for LAEs at z ~3, allowing an improved estimate of the space density of this population of 3+-1x10^-4 h_70^3/Mpc^3. Spectroscopic follow-up of 23 candidates yielded 18 redshifts, all at z ~=3.1. Over 80% of the LAEs are dimmer in continuum magnitude than the typical Lyman break galaxy spectroscopic limit of R= 25.5 (AB), with a median continuum magnitude R ~=27 and very blue continuum colors, (V-z) ~=0. Over 80% of the LAEs have the right UVR colors to be selected as Lyman break galaxies, but only 10% also have R<=25.5. Stacking the UBVRIzJK fluxes reveals that LAEs have stellar masses ~=5x10^8 h_70^-2 M_sun and minimal dust extinction, A_V<~ 0.1. Inferred star formation rates are ~=6 h_70^-2 M_sun/yr, yielding a cosmic star formation rate density of 2x10^-3 h_70 M_sun/yr/Mpc^3. None of our LAE candidates show evidence for rest-frame emission line equivalent widths EW_rest>240A which might imply a non-standard IMF. One candidate is detected by Chandra, implying an AGN fraction of 2+-2% for LAE candidate samples. In summary, LAEs at z ~ 3 have rapid star formation, low stellar mass, little dust obscuration and no evidence for a substantial AGN component.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

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In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. P. Hopkins
2. L. Hernquist
3. D. M. Alexander
4. P. V. van Dokkum
5. Richard S. Ellis
6. C. Conroy
7. Christopher J. Conselice
8. M. Franx

In Instrumentation

1. P. V. van Dokkum
2. A. Renzini
3. M. Franx
4. C. Conroy
5. D. M. Alexander
6. Richard S. Ellis
7. Christopher J. Conselice
8. A. Koekemoer

Citations in the corpus

• Galaxy Zoo Green Peas: discovery of a class of compact extremely star-forming galaxies (2009, background): “For Lyα emitters, most are selected to have EW of Lyα > 20 Å and can range up to∼240Å or more (Gawiser et al. 2006; Gronwall et al. 2007).”
• Lyα Emission-Line Galaxies at z = 3.1 in the Extended Chandra Deep Field-South (2007, methodology): “…fromMorphology and SEDs program (GEMS; Rix et al. 2004); deep groundbasedUBVRIzJHK photometry from theMultiwavelength Survey by Yale-Chile (MUSYC; Gawiser et al. 2006b); mid- and far-IR observations from Spitzer, GOODS, and MUSYC; and deep X-ray data from Chandra (Giacconi et al. 2002; Alexander…”
• Reionization and Galaxy Evolution Probed by z = 7 Lyα Emitters (2007, background): “We consider that this is a reasonable assumption, since observations indicate that the escape fraction of Lyα photons is about unity at least for LAEs at z ∼ 3 (Gawiser et al. 2006).”
• Using Lyman-α to detect galaxies that leak Lyman continuum (2014, background): “…& Loeb 2013; Yajima et al. 2011; Wise & Cen 2009), which superficially seems to be consitent with the stronger LyC leakage found from Article published by EDP Sciences A7, page 1 of 13 z ∼ 3 LAEs, which tend to occupy lower mass haloes (Ouchi et al. 2005; Gawiser et al. 2006; Guaita et al. 2011).”
• The first appearance of the red sequence of galaxies in proto-clusters at 2 <~ z <~ 3 (2007, background): “…we discuss later, these proto-clusters already seem to contain an evolved galaxy population as well as young Lyα/Hα emitters (Kurk et al. 2004a; 2004b; Venemans et al. 2007) which tend to be much less massive, typically by more than an order of magnitude (Gawiser et al. 2006; Venemans et al. 2005).”
• The Subaru/XMM-Newton Deep Survey (SXDS). IV. Evolution of Lyα Emitters from z = 3.1 to 5.7 in the 1 deg2 Field: Luminosity Functions and AGN (2007, background): “We compare the SFRD estimated from the Ly LF of z ¼ 3:1 LAEs that was recently obtained by MUSYC.”
• The WIRCam Deep Survey I. Counts, colours, and mass-functions derived from near-infrared imaging in the CFHTLS deep fields (2011, background): “…∼ 2, the ultraviolet spectral features are redshifted into the optical and the galaxy population can be readily identified via the Lyman Break (e.g. Steidel et al. 1996, 2003; Cooke et al. 2006; Bielby et al. 2011) and Lyα emission (e.g. Cowie & Hu 1998; Ouchi et al. 2003; Gawiser et al. 2006).”
• SPECTROSCOPIC OBSERVATIONS OF LYMAN BREAK GALAXIES AT REDSHIFTS ∼4, 5, AND 6 IN THE GOODS-SOUTH FIELD (2009, background): “Lyα–emitting LBGs at z ∼ 3 − 4 are found to have smaller stellar masses than objects lacking this emission (e.g. Gawiser et al. 2006).”
• Hyper-Eddington accretion flows on to massive black holes (2015, background): “This fact is consistent with observations that there are only a few detections of X-ray emission from LAEs so far5 (e.g. Wang et al. 2004; Gawiser et al. 2006; Zheng et al. 2010).”
• Lyα-EMITTING GALAXIES AT z = 2.1 IN ECDF-S: BUILDING BLOCKS OF TYPICAL PRESENT-DAY GALAXIES? (2009, methodology): “We followed the NDWFS (NOAO Deep Wide-Field Survey) cookbook 3 as modified by Gawiser et al. (2006a) plus a few additional steps described below.”
• THE HETDEX PILOT SURVEY. II. THE EVOLUTION OF THE Lyα ESCAPE FRACTION FROM THE ULTRAVIOLET SLOPE AND LUMINOSITY FUNCTION OF 1.9 (2010, methodology): “While most studies of narrow-band selected LAEs at z ∼ 3 seem to indicate they are consistent with very low dust or dust-free stellar populations (Gawiser et al. 2006a, 2007; Nilsson et al. 2007; Gronwall et al. 2007; Ouchi et al. 2008), there have been recent results suggesting that the LAE…”
• Evolution in the properties of Lyman-α emitters from redshifts z ~ 3 to z ~ 2 (2008, background): “At z ∼ 3, Gawiser et al. (2006) inferred stellar masses of a few ×108 M⊙, almost no dust extinction, and ages of the order of 100 Myr.”
• THE MULTIWAVELENGTH SURVEY BY YALE–CHILE (MUSYC): DEEP MEDIUM-BAND OPTICAL IMAGING AND HIGH-QUALITY 32-BAND PHOTOMETRIC REDSHIFTS IN THE ECDF-S (2010, methodology): “The FWHM of the broad band filters is indicated by a red line.”
• COLOR–MAGNITUDE RELATIONS OF ACTIVE AND NON-ACTIVE GALAXIES IN THE CHANDRA DEEP FIELDS: HIGH-REDSHIFT CONSTRAINTS AND STELLAR-MASS SELECTION EFFECTS (2010, methodology): “For the CDF-S, we combined three catalogs to produce a base catalog: (1) the MUSYCBVR-detected optical catalog (U,B,V,R, I ,o3,z; Gawiser et al. 2006); (2) the COMBO-17 optical catalog (U,B,V,R, I + 12 medium-band filters; Wolf et al. 2004, 2008); and (3) the GOODS-S MUSIC catalog (U , F435W,…”
• ON THE STELLAR POPULATIONS AND EVOLUTION OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES AT 6.3 < z ⩽ 8.6 (2009, background): “LYMAN ALPHA EMISSION Galaxies selected on the basis of their high Lyα emission generally correspond to younger, less massive galaxies with lower dust attenuation (e.g., Gawiser et al. 2006; Pirzkal et .”