We present new measurements of the cosmic cold molecular gas evolution out to redshift 6 based on systematic mining of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) public archive in the ...COSMOS deep field (A3COSMOS). Our A3COSMOS data set contains ∼700 galaxies (0.3 z 6) with high-confidence ALMA detections in the (sub)millimeter continuum and multiwavelength spectral energy distributions. Multiple gas mass calibration methods are compared, and biases in band conversions (from observed ALMA wavelength to rest-frame Rayleigh-Jeans tail continuum) have been tested. Combining our A3COSMOS sample with ∼1000 CO-observed galaxies at 0 z 4 (75% at z < 0.1), we parameterize galaxies' molecular gas depletion time ( ) and molecular gas to stellar mass ratio ( ) each as a function of the stellar mass ( ), offset from the star-forming main sequence ( ) and cosmic age (or redshift). Our proposed functional form provides a statistically better fit to current data (than functional forms in the literature) and implies a "downsizing" effect (i.e., more-massive galaxies evolve earlier than less-massive ones) and "mass quenching" (gas consumption slows down with cosmic time for massive galaxies but speeds up for low-mass ones). Adopting galaxy stellar mass functions and applying our function for gas mass calculation, we for the first time infer the cosmic cold molecular gas density evolution out to redshift 6 and find agreement with CO blind surveys as well as semianalytic modeling. These together provide a coherent picture of cold molecular gas, star formation rate, and stellar mass evolution in galaxies across cosmic time.
Abstract
We present the results of a systematic search for candidate quiescent galaxies in the distant universe in 11 JWST fields with publicly available observations collected during the first 3 ...months of operations and covering an effective sky area of ∼145 arcmin
2
. We homogeneously reduce the new JWST data and combine them with existing observations from the Hubble Space Telescope. We select a robust sample of ∼80 candidate quiescent and quenching galaxies at 3 <
z
< 5 using two methods: (1) based on their rest-frame
UVJ
colors, and (2) a novel quantitative approach based on Gaussian mixture modeling of the near-UV −
U
,
U
−
V
, and
V
−
J
rest-frame color space, which is more sensitive to recently quenched objects. We measure comoving number densities of massive (
M
⋆
≥ 10
10.6
M
⊙
) quiescent galaxies consistent with previous estimates relying on ground-based observations, after homogenizing the results in the literature with our mass and redshift intervals. However, we find significant field-to-field variations of the number densities up to a factor of 2–3, highlighting the effect of cosmic variance and suggesting the presence of overdensities of red quiescent galaxies at
z
> 3, as could be expected for highly clustered massive systems. Importantly, JWST enables the robust identification of quenching/quiescent galaxy candidates at lower masses and higher redshifts than before, challenging standard formation scenarios. All data products, including the literature compilation, are made publicly available.
Abstract
We report the multiwavelength properties of millimeter galaxies hosting X-ray detected active galactic nuclei (AGNs) from the ALMA Lensing Cluster Survey (ALCS). ALCS is an extensive survey ...of well-studied lensing clusters with ALMA, covering an area of 133 arcmin
2
over 33 clusters with a 1.2 mm flux-density limit of ∼60
μ
Jy (1
σ
). Utilizing the archival data of Chandra, we identify three AGNs at
z
= 1.06, 2.09, and 2.84 among the 180 millimeter sources securely detected in the ALCS (of which 155 are inside the coverage of Chandra). The X-ray spectral analysis shows that two AGNs are not significantly absorbed (
log
N
H
/
cm
−
2
<
23
), while the other shows signs of moderate absorption (
log
N
H
/
cm
−
2
∼
23.5
). We also perform spectral energy distribution modeling of X-ray to millimeter photometry. We find that our X-ray AGN sample shows both high mass-accretion rates (intrinsic 0.5–8 keV X-ray luminosities of ∼10
44–45
erg s
−1
) and star formation rates (≳100
M
⊙
yr
−1
). This demonstrates that a wide-area survey with ALMA and Chandra can selectively detect intense growth of both galaxies and supermassive black holes in the high-redshift universe.
We present the first results of an Atacama Large Millimeter Array survey of the lower fine-structure line of atomic carbon C i in far-infrared-selected galaxies on the main sequence at z ∼ 1.2 in the ...COSMOS field. We compare our sample with a comprehensive compilation of data available in the literature for local and high-redshift starbursting systems and quasars. We show that the C i (3P1 → 3P0) luminosity correlates on global scales with the infrared luminosity , similar to low-J CO transitions. We report a systematic variation of / as a function of the galaxy type, with the ratio being larger for main-sequence galaxies than for starbursts and submillimeter galaxies at fixed . The / and / mass ratios are similar for main-sequence galaxies and for local and high-redshift starbursts within a 0.2 dex intrinsic scatter, suggesting that C i is a good tracer of molecular gas mass as CO and dust. We derive a fraction of of the total carbon mass in the atomic neutral phase. Moreover, we estimate the neutral atomic carbon abundance, the fundamental ingredient to calibrate C i as a gas tracer, by comparing and available gas masses from CO lines and dust emission. We find lower C i abundances in main-sequence galaxies than in starbursting systems and submillimeter galaxies as a consequence of the canonical CO and gas-to-dust conversion factors. This argues against the application to different galaxy populations of a universal standard C i abundance derived from highly biased samples.
We present the first stellar velocity dispersion measurement of a massive quenching galaxy at z = 4. The galaxy is first identified as a massive z ≥ 4 galaxy with suppressed star formation from ...photometric redshifts based on deep multiband data. A follow-up spectroscopic observation with MOSFIRE on Keck revealed strong multiple absorption features, which are identified as Balmer lines, giving a secure redshift of z = 4.01. This is the most distant quiescent galaxy known to date. Thanks to the high S/N of the spectrum, we are able to estimate the stellar velocity dispersion, , making a significant leap from the previous highest redshift measurement at z = 2.8. Interestingly, we find that the velocity dispersion is consistent with that of massive galaxies today, implying no significant evolution in velocity dispersion over the last 12 Gyr. Based on a stringent upper limit on its physical size from deep optical images (reff < 1.3 kpc), we find that its dynamical mass is consistent with the stellar mass inferred from photometry. Furthermore, the galaxy is located on the mass fundamental plane extrapolated from lower redshift galaxies. The observed no strong evolution in suggests that the mass in the core of massive galaxies does not evolve significantly, while most of the mass growth occurs in the outskirts of the galaxies, which also increases the size. This picture is consistent with a two-phase formation scenario in which mass and size growth is due to accretion in the outskirts of galaxies via mergers. Our results imply that the first phase may be completed as early as z ∼ 4.
We present new observations, carried out with IRAM NOEMA, of the atomic neutral carbon transitions C
I
(
3
P
1
–
3
P
0
) at 492 GHz and C
I
(
3
P
2
–
3
P
1
) at 809 GHz of GN20, a well-studied ...star-bursting galaxy at
z
= 4.05. The high luminosity line ratio C
I
(
3
P
2
–
3
P
1
) /C
I
(
3
P
1
–
3
P
0
) implies an excitation temperature of 48
+14
−9
K, which is significantly higher than the apparent dust temperature of
T
d
= 33 ± 2 K (
β
= 1.9) derived under the common assumption of an optically thin far-infrared dust emission, but fully consistent with
T
d
= 52 ± 5 K of a general opacity model where the optical depth (
τ
) reaches unity at a wavelength of
λ
0
= 170 ± 23
μ
m. Moreover, the general opacity solution returns a factor of ∼2× lower dust mass and, hence, a lower molecular gas mass for a fixed gas-to-dust ratio, than with the optically thin dust model. The derived properties of GN20 thus provide an appealing solution to the puzzling discovery of starbursts appearing colder than main-sequence galaxies above
z
> 2.5, in addition to a lower dust-to-stellar mass ratio that approaches the physical value predicted for starburst galaxies.
Full text
Available for:
FMFMET, NUK, UL, UM, UPUK
Star formation in half of massive galaxies was quenched by the time the Universe was 3 billion years old.sup.1. Very low amounts of molecular gas seem to be responsible for this, at least in some ...cases.sup.2-7, although morphological gas stabilization, shock heating or activity associated with accretion onto a central supermassive black hole are invoked in other cases.sup.8-11. Recent studies of quenching by gas depletion have been based on upper limits that are insufficiently sensitive to determine this robustly.sup.2-7, or stacked emission with its problems of averaging.sup.8,9. Here we report 1.3 mm observations of dust emission from 6 strongly lensed galaxies where star formation has been quenched, with magnifications of up to a factor of 30. Four of the six galaxies are undetected in dust emission, with an estimated upper limit on the dust mass of 0.0001 times the stellar mass, and by proxy (assuming a Milky Way molecular gas-to-dust ratio) 0.01 times the stellar mass in molecular gas. This is two orders of magnitude less molecular gas per unit stellar mass than seen in star forming galaxies at similar redshifts.sup.12-14. It remains difficult to extrapolate from these small samples, but these observations establish that gas depletion is responsible for a cessation of star formation in some fraction of high-redshift galaxies.
Full text
Available for:
GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK, ZAGLJ
Abstract
We present the characteristics of 2 mm selected sources from the largest Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) blank-field contiguous survey conducted to date, the Mapping ...Obscuration to Reionization with ALMA (MORA) survey covering 184 arcmin
2
at 2 mm. Twelve of 13 detections above 5
σ
are attributed to emission from galaxies, 11 of which are dominated by cold dust emission. These sources have a median redshift of
〈
z
2
mm
〉
=
3.6
−
0.3
+
0.4
primarily based on optical/near-infrared photometric redshifts with some spectroscopic redshifts, with 77% ± 11% of sources at
z
> 3 and 38% ± 12% of sources at
z
> 4. This implies that 2 mm selection is an efficient method for identifying the highest-redshift dusty star-forming galaxies (DSFGs). Lower-redshift DSFGs (
z
< 3) are far more numerous than those at
z
> 3 yet are likely to drop out at 2 mm. MORA shows that DSFGs with star formation rates in excess of 300
M
⊙
yr
−1
and a relative rarity of ∼10
−5
Mpc
−3
contribute ∼30% to the integrated star formation rate density at 3 <
z
< 6. The volume density of 2 mm selected DSFGs is consistent with predictions from some cosmological simulations and is similar to the volume density of their hypothesized descendants: massive, quiescent galaxies at
z
> 2. Analysis of MORA sources’ spectral energy distributions hint at steeper empirically measured dust emissivity indices than reported in typical literature studies, with
〈
β
〉
=
2.2
−
0.4
+
0.5
. The MORA survey represents an important step in taking census of obscured star formation in the universe’s first few billion years, but larger area 2 mm surveys are needed to more fully characterize this rare population and push to the detection of the universe’s first dusty galaxies.
Abstract
We study the carbon monoxide (CO) excitation, mean molecular gas density, and interstellar radiation field (ISRF) intensity in a comprehensive sample of 76 galaxies from local to high ...redshift (
z
∼ 0–6), selected based on detections of their CO transitions
J
= 2 → 1 and 5 → 4 and their optical/infrared/(sub)millimeter spectral energy distributions (SEDs). We confirm the existence of a tight correlation between CO excitation as traced by the CO (5–4)
/
(2–1) line ratio
R
52
and the mean ISRF intensity
U
as derived from infrared SED fitting using dust SED templates. By modeling the molecular gas density probability distribution function (PDF) in galaxies and predicting CO line ratios with large velocity gradient radiative transfer calculations, we present a framework linking global CO line ratios to the mean molecular hydrogen gas density
n
H
2
and kinetic temperature
T
kin
. Mapping in this way observed
R
52
ratios to
n
H
2
and
T
kin
probability distributions, we obtain positive
U
–
n
H
2
and
U
–
T
kin
correlations, which imply a scenario in which the ISRF in galaxies is mainly regulated by
T
kin
and (nonlinearly) by
n
H
2
. A small fraction of starburst galaxies showing enhanced
n
H
2
could be due to merger-driven compaction. Our work demonstrates that ISRF and CO excitation are tightly coupled and that density–PDF modeling is a promising tool for probing detailed ISM properties inside galaxies.
We report two secure ( ) and one tentative (z 3.767) spectroscopic confirmations of massive and quiescent galaxies through K-band observations with Keck/MOSFIRE and Very Large Telescope/X-Shooter. ...The stellar continuum emission, absence of strong nebular emission lines, and lack of significant far-infrared detections confirm the passive nature of these objects, disfavoring the alternative solution of low-redshift dusty star-forming interlopers. We derive stellar masses of log(M /M ) ∼ 11 and ongoing star formation rates placing these galaxies 1-2 dex below the main sequence at their redshifts. The adopted parameterization of the star formation history suggests that these sources experienced a strong ( M yr−1) and short (∼50 Myr) burst of star formation, peaking ∼150-500 Myr before the time of observation, all properties reminiscent of the characteristics of submillimeter galaxies (SMGs) at z > 4. We investigate this connection by comparing the comoving number densities and the properties of these two populations. We find a fair agreement only with the deepest submillimeter surveys detecting not only the most extreme starbursts but also more normal galaxies. We support these findings by further exploring the Illustris TNG cosmological simulation, retrieving populations of both fully quenched massive galaxies at z ∼ 3-4 and SMGs at z ∼ 4−5, with number densities and properties in agreement with the observations at z ∼ 3 but in increasing tension at higher redshift. Nevertheless, as suggested by the observations, not all of the progenitors of quiescent galaxies at these redshifts shine as bright SMGs in their past, and, similarly, not all bright SMGs quench by z ∼ 3, both fractions depending on the threshold assumed to define the SMGs themselves.
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