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Register a new userThe evolution of the UV luminosity and stellar mass functions of Lyman-alpha emitters from z~2 to z~6
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We measure the evolution of the rest-frame UV luminosity function (LF) and the stellar mass function (SMF) of Lyman-alpha (Lya) emitters (LAEs) from z~2 to z~6 by exploring ~4000 LAEs from the SC4K sample. We find a correlation between Lya luminosity (LLya) and rest-frame UV (M_UV), with best-fit M_UV=-1.6+-0.2 log10(LLya/erg/s)+47+-12 and a shallower relation between LLya and stellar mass (Mstar), with best-fit log10( Mstar/Msun)=0.9+-0.1 log10(LLya/erg/s)-28+-4.0. An increasing LLya cut predominantly lowers the number density of faint M_UV and low Mstar LAEs. We estimate a proxy for the full UV LFs and SMFs of LAEs with simple assumptions of the faint end slope. For the UV LF, we find a brightening of the characteristic UV luminosity (M_UV*) with increasing redshift and a decrease of the characteristic number density (Phi*). For the SMF, we measure a characteristic stellar mass (Mstar*/Msun) increase with increasing redshift, and a Phi* decline. However, if we apply a uniform luminosity cut of log10 (LLya/erg/s) >= 43.0, we find much milder to no evolution in the UV and SMF of LAEs. The UV luminosity density (rho_UV) of the full sample of LAEs shows moderate evolution and the stellar mass density (rho_M) decreases, with both being always lower than the total rho_UV and rho_M of more typical galaxies but slowly approaching them with increasing redshift. Overall, our results indicate that both rho_UV and rho_M of LAEs slowly approach the measurements of continuum-selected galaxies at z>6, which suggests a key role of LAEs in the epoch of reionisation.
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We investigate the rest-frame UV morphologies of a large sample of Lyman-a emitters (LAEs) from z~2 to z~6, selected in a uniform way with 16 different narrow- and medium-bands over the full COSMOS field. We use 3045 LAEs with HST coverage in a stacking analysis and find that they have M_UV~-20, below M*_UV at these redshifts. We also focus our analysis on a subsample of 780 individual galaxies with i_AB<25 for which GALFIT converges for 429 of them. The individual median size (re~1 kpc), ellipticities (slightly elongated with (b/a)~0.45), Sersic index (disk-like with n<2) and light concentration (comparable to that of disk or irregular galaxies, with C~2.7) of LAEs show mild evolution from z~2 to z~6. LAEs with the highest rest-frame equivalent widths (EW) are the smallest/most compact (re~0.8 kpc, compared to re~1.5 kpc for the lower EW LAEs). When stacking our samples in bins of fixed Lya luminosity and Lya EW we find evidence for redshift evolution in n and C, but not in galaxy sizes. The evolution seems to be stronger for LAEs with 25<EW<100 {AA}. When compared to other SFGs, LAEs are found to be smaller at all redshifts. The difference between the two populations changes with redshift, from a factor of ~1 at z>5 to SFGs being a factor of ~2-4 larger than LAEs for z<2. This means that at the highest redshifts, where typical sizes approach those of LAEs, the fraction of galaxies showing Lya in emission (and with a high Lya escape fraction) should be much higher, consistent with observations.
Context: Narrow-band surveys for Ly-alpha emitters (LAEs) is a powerful tool in detecting high, and very high, redshift galaxies. Even though samples are growing at redshifts z = 3 - 6, the nature of these galaxies is still poorly known. Aims: To study the properties of z = 2.25 LAEs and compare those with the properties of z > 3 LAEs. Methods: We present narrow-band imaging made with the MPG/ESO 2.2m telescope with the WFI detector. We have made a selection for emission-line objects and find 170 candidate typical LAEs and 17 candidates which we regard as high UV-transmission LAEs. We have derived the magnitudes of these objects in 8 bands from u* to Ks, and studied if they have X-ray and/or radio counterparts. Results: We show that there has been significant evolution in the properties of LAEs between redshift z ~ 3 and z = 2.25. The spread in spectral energy distributions (SEDs) at the lower redshift is larger and we detect a significant AGN contribution in the sample. The distribution of the equivalent widths is narrower than at z ~ 3, with only a few candidates with rest-frame equivalent width above the predicted limit of 240 A. The star formation rates derived from the Ly-alpha emission compared to that derived from the UV emission are lower by on average a factor of ~ 1.8, indicating a large absorption of dust. Conclusion: LAEs at redshift z = 2.25 may be more evolved than LAEs at higher redshift. The red SEDs imply more massive, older and/or more dusty galaxies at lower redshift than observed at higher redshifts. The decrease in equivalent widths and star formation rates indicate more quiescent galaxies, with in general less star formation than in higher redshift galaxies. At z = 2.25, AGN appear to be more abundant and also to contribute more to the LAE population. [Abridged]
Aims. The aim of this work is to constrain the evolution of the fraction of Lya emitters among UV selected star forming galaxies at 2<z<6, and to measure the stellar escape fraction of Lya photons over the same redshift range. Methods. We exploit the ultradeep spectroscopic observations collected by the VIMOS Ultra Deep Survey (VUDS) to build an unique, complete and unbiased sample of 4000 spectroscopically confirmed star forming galaxies at 2<z<6. Our galaxy sample UV luminosities brighter than M* at 2<z<6, and luminosities down to one magnitude fainter than M* at 2<z<3.5. Results. We find that 80% of the star forming galaxies in our sample have EW0(Lya)<10A, and correspondingly fesc(Lya)<1%. By comparing these results with literature, we conclude that the bulk of the Lya luminosity at 2<z<6 comes from galaxies that are fainter in the UV than those we sample in this work. The strong Lya emitters constitute, at each redshift, the tail of the distribution of the galaxies with extreme EW0(Lya) and fesc(Lya) . This tail of large EW0 and fesc(Lya) becomes more important as the redshift increases, and causes the fraction of Lya with EW0> 25A to increase from 5% at z=2 to 30% at z=6, with the increase being relatively stronger beyond z=4. We observe no difference, for the narrow range of UV luminosities explored in this work, between the fraction of strong Lya emitters among galaxies fainter or brighter than M*, although the fraction for the FUV faint galaxies evolves faster, at 2<z<3.5, than for the bright ones. We do observe an anticorrelation between E(B-V) and fesc(Lya): generally galaxies with high fesc(Lya) have also small amounts of dust (and viceversa). However, when the dust content is low (E(B-V)<0.05) we observe a very broad range of fesc(Lya), ranging from 10^-3 to 1. This implies that the dust alone is not the only regulator of the amount of escaping Lya photons.
Lyman alpha (Lya) emission lines should be attenuated in a neutral intergalactic medium (IGM). Therefore the visibility of Lya emitters at high redshifts can serve as a valuable probe of reionization at about the 50% level. We present an imaging search for z=7.7 Lya emitting galaxies using an ultra-narrowband filter (filter width= 9A) on the NEWFIRM imager at the Kitt Peak National Observatory. We found four candidate Lya emitters in a survey volume of 1.4 x 10^4 Mpc^3, with a line flux brighter than 6x10^-18 erg/cm^2/s (5 sigma in 2 aperture). We also performed a detailed Monte-Carlo simulation incorporating the instrumental effects to estimate the expected number of Lya emitters in our survey, and found that we should expect to detect one Lya emitter, assuming a non-evolving Lya luminosity function (LF) between z=6.5 and z=7.7. Even if one of the present candidates is spectroscopically confirmed as a z~8 Lya emitter, it would indicate that there is no significant evolution of the Lya LF from z=3.1 to z~8. While firm conclusions would need both spectroscopic confirmations and larger surveys to boost the number counts of galaxies, we successfully demonstrate the feasibility of sensitive near-infrared (1.06 um) narrow-band searches using custom filters designed to avoid the OH emission lines that make up most of the sky background.
We present a clustering analysis of a sample of 238 Ly{$alpha$}-emitters at redshift 3<z<6 from the MUSE-Wide survey. This survey mosaics extragalactic legacy fields with 1h MUSE pointings to detect statistically relevant samples of emission line galaxies. We analysed the first year observations from MUSE-Wide making use of the clustering signal in the line-of-sight direction. This method relies on comparing pair-counts at close redshifts for a fixed transverse distance and thus exploits the full potential of the redshift range covered by our sample. A clear clustering signal with a correlation length of r0 = 2.9(+1.0/-1.1) Mpc (comoving) is detected. Whilst this result is based on only about a quarter of the full survey size, it already shows the immense potential of MUSE for efficiently observing and studying the clustering of Ly{$alpha$}-emitters.
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