THE ERA OF STAR FORMATION IN GALAXY CLUSTERS

By M. Brodwin, S. Stanford, Anthony H. Gonzalez, G. Zeimann, Gregory F. Snyder, C. Mancone, Adrian Pope, Peter Eisenhardt, Daniel Stern, S. Alberts and 10 more. 2013

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We analyze the star formation properties of 16 infrared-selected, spectroscopically confirmed galaxy clusters at 1 < z < 1.5 from the Spitzer/IRAC Shallow Cluster Survey (ISCS). We present new spectroscopic confirmation for six of these high-redshift clusters, five of which are at z > 1.35. Using infrared luminosities measured with deep Spitzer/Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer observations at 24 μm, along with robust optical + IRAC photometric redshifts and spectral-energy-distribution-fitted stellar masses, we present the dust-obscured star-forming fractions, star formation rates, and specific star formation rates in these clusters as functions of redshift and projected clustercentric radius. We find that z ∼ 1.4 represents a transition redshift for the ISCS sample, with clear evidence of an unquenched era of cluster star formation at earlier times. Beyond this redshift, the fraction of star-forming cluster members increases monotonically toward the cluster centers. Indeed, the specific star formation rate in the cores of these distant clusters is consistent with field values at similar redshifts, indicating that at z > 1.4 environment-dependent quenching had not yet been established in ISCS clusters. By combining these observations with complementary studies showing a rapid increase in the active galactic nucleus (AGN) fraction, a stochastic star formation history, and a major merging episode at the same epoch in this cluster sample, we suggest that the starburst activity is likely merger-driven and that the subsequent quenching is due to feedback from merger-fueled AGNs. The totality of the evidence suggests we are witnessing the final quenching period that brings an end to the era of star formation in galaxy clusters and initiates the era of passive evolution.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9fa76932d7e5c00cdeff98f4187aacaf8cac627a

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Citations in the corpus

The DEIMOS 10K Spectroscopic Survey Catalog of the COSMOS Field (2018, background): “A statistical study of clusters in the redshift range 1<z<1.5 shows that the fraction of star-forming galaxies is systematically suppressed in the cluster centers and increases to the value of the field galaxies toward the cluster outskirts (Brodwin et al. 2013).”
GALAXY CLUSTERS DISCOVERED VIA THE SUNYAEV–ZEL'DOVICH EFFECT IN THE 2500-SQUARE-DEGREE SPT-SZ SURVEY (2014, background): “…that the Spitzeronly [3.6]−[4.5] colors are probing near the peak in the stellar emission, rather than the Balmer break; as such, they are less sensitive to the effects of recent star formation or active galactic nucleus activity which may be more prevalent at high redshift (Brodwin et al. 2013).”
ZFIRE: THE KINEMATICS OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES AS A FUNCTION OF ENVIRONMENT AT z ∼ 2 (2016, background): “At z > 1, cluster galaxies have significant ongoing star formation (Rettura et al. 2010; Tran et al. 2010; Brodwin et al. 2013; Santos et al. 2014).”
The realm of the galaxy protoclusters (2016, background): “…or starbursting galaxies not seen at the lower redshifts (e.g., Hilton et al., 2010; Tran et al., 2010; Fassbender et al., 2011; Gobat et al., 2013; Brodwin et al., 2013; Strazzullo et al., 2013; Lee et al., 2015; Mei et al., 2015; Wang et al., 2016) (but see Cooke et al., 2016; Andreon et al.,…”