No Arabic abstract
We study the distribution and dynamics of the circum- and intergalactic medium using a dense galaxy survey covering the field around the Q0107 system, a unique z~1 projected quasar triplet. With full Ly$alpha$ coverage along all three lines-of-sight from z=0.18 to z=0.73, more than 1200 galaxy spectra, and two MUSE fields, we examine the structure of the gas around galaxies on 100-1000 kpc scales. We search for H I absorption systems occurring at the same redshift (within 500 $textrm{km}$ $textrm{s}^{-1}$) in multiple sightlines, finding with $>$ 99.9% significance that these systems are more frequent in the observed quasar spectra than in a randomly distributed population of absorbers. This is driven primarily by absorption with column densities N(H I) $> 10^{14}$ $textrm{cm}^{-2}$, whilst multi-sightline absorbers with lower column densities are consistent with a random distribution. Star-forming galaxies are more likely to be associated with multi-sightline absorption than quiescent galaxies. HST imaging provides inclinations and position angles for a subset of these galaxies. We observe a bimodality in the position angle of detected galaxy-absorber pairs, again driven mostly by high-column-density absorbers, with absorption preferentially along the major and minor axes of galaxies out to impact parameters of several hundred kpc. We find some evidence supporting a disk/outflow dichotomy, as H I absorbers near the projected major-axis of a galaxy show line-of-sight velocities that tend to align with the rotation of that galaxy, whilst minor-axis absorbers are twice as likely to exhibit O VI at the same redshift.
Measuring molecular gas mass is vital for understanding the evolution of galaxies at high redshifts (z$geq$1). Most measurements rely on CO as a tracer, but dependences on metallicity, dynamics and surface density lead to systematic uncertainties in high-z galaxies, where these physical properties are difficult to observe, and where the physical environments can differ systematically from those at z=0. Dust continuum emission provides a potential alternative assuming a known dust/gas ratio, but this must be calibrated on a direct gas tracer at z$geq$1. In this paper we consider the [CI] 492-GHz emission line, which has been shown to trace molecular gas closely throughout Galactic clouds and has the advantages of being optically thin in typical conditions (unlike CO), and being observable at accessible frequencies at high redshifts (in contrast to the low-excitation lines of CO). We use the Atacama Large Millimetre/submillimetre Array (ALMA) to measure [CI], CO(4-3) and dust emission in a representative sample of star-forming galaxies at z=1, and combine these data with multi-wavelength spectral energy distributions to study relationships between dust and gas components of galaxies. We uncover a strong [CI]-dust correlation, suggesting that both trace similar phases of the gas. By incorporating other samples from the literature, we show that this correlation persists over a wide range of luminosities and redshifts up to z$sim$4. Finally we explore the implications of our results as an independent test of literature calibrations for dust as a tracer of gas mass, and for predicting the CI abundance.
Using a sample of 299 Ha-selected galaxies at z~0.8, we study the relationship between galaxy stellar mass, gas-phase metallicity, and star formation rate (SFR), and compare to previous results. We use deep optical spectra obtained with the IMACS spectrograph at the Magellan telescope to measure strong oxygen lines. We combine these spectra and metallicities with (1) rest-frame UV-to-optical imaging, which allows us to determine stellar masses and dust attenuation corrections, and (2) Ha narrowband imaging, which provides a robust measure of the instantaneous SFR. Our sample spans stellar masses of 10^9 to 6*10^11 solar masses, SFRs of 0.4 to 270 solar masses per year, and metal abundances of 12+log(O/H)~8.3-9.1 (~0.4-2.6 solar metallicity). The correlations that we find between the Ha-based SFR and stellar mass (i.e., the star-forming main sequence), and between the stellar mass and metallicity, are both consistent with previous z~1 studies of star-forming galaxies. We then study the relationship between the three properties using various plane-fitting techniques (Lara-Lopez et al.) and a curve-fitting projection (Mannucci et al.). In all cases, we exclude strong dependence of the M-Z relation on SFR, but are unable to distinguish between moderate and no dependence. Our results are consistent with previous mass-metallicity-SFR studies. We check whether dataset limitations may obscure a strong dependence on the SFR by using mock samples drawn from the SDSS. These experiments reveal that the adopted signal-to-noise cuts may have a significant effect on the measured dependence. Further work is needed to investigate these results, and to test whether a fundamental metallicity relation or a fundamental plane describes star-forming galaxies across cosmic time.
We investigate the link between AGN activity, star-formation and stellar mass of the host galaxy at 0<z<1, looking for spectroscopic traces of AGN and aging of the host. This work provides an extension of the existing studies at z<0.1 and contributes to shed light on galaxy evolution at intermediate redshifts. We used the zCOSMOS 20k data to create a sample of galaxies at z<1. We divided the sample in several mass-redshift bins to obtain stacked galaxy spectra with an improved S/N. We exploited emission-line diagnostic diagrams to separate AGN from star-forming galaxies. We found indication of a role for the total galaxy stellar mass in leading galaxy classification. Stacked spectra show AGN signatures above the log M_*/M_sun>10.2 threshold. Moreover, the stellar populations of AGN hosts are found to be older with respect to star-forming and composites galaxies. This could be due to the the tendency of AGN to reside in massive hosts. The dependence of the AGN classification on the stellar mass is in agreement with what has been already found in previous studies. It is consistent with, together with the evidence of older stellar populations inhabiting the AGN-like galaxies, the downsizing scenario. In particular, our evidence points to an evolutionary scenario where the AGN-feedback is capable of quenching the star formation in the most massive galaxies. Therefore, the AGN-feedback is the best candidate for initiating the passive evolutionary phase of galaxies.
Due to the fact that HI mass measurements are not available for large galaxy samples at high redshifts, we apply a photometric estimator of the HI-to-stellar mass ratio (M_HI/M_*) calibrated using a local Universe sample of galaxies to a sample of galaxies at z ~ 1 in the DEEP2 survey. We use these HI mass estimates to calculate HI mass functions (HIMFs) and cosmic HI mass densities (Omega_HI), and to examine the correlation between star formation rate and HI gas content, for galaxies at z ~ 1. We have estimated HI gas masses for ~ 7,000 galaxies in the DEEP2 survey with redshifts in the range 0.75 < z < 1.4 and stellar masses M_* > 10^{10} M_solar, using a combination of the rest-frame ultraviolet-optical colour (NUV - r) and stellar mass density (mu_*) as a way to estimate M_HI/M_*. It is found that the high mass end of high-z HI mass function (HIMF) is quite similar to that of the local HIMF. The lower limit of Omega_HI,limit = 2.1 * 10^{-4} h_70^{-1}, obtained by directly integrating the HI mass of galaxies with M_* > 10^{10} M_solar, confirms that massive star-forming galaxies do not dominate the neutral gas at z ~ 1. We study the evolution of the HI mass to stellar mass ratio from z ~ 1 to today and find a steeper relation between HI gas mass fraction and stellar mass at higher redshifts. Specifically, galaxies with M_* = 10^{11} M_solar at z ~ 1 are found to have 3 - 4 times higher neutral gas fractions than local galaxies, while the increase is as high as 4 - 12 times at M_* = 10^{10} M_solar. The quantity M_HI/SFR exhibits very large scatter, and the scatter increases from a factor of 5 - 7 at z = 0 to factors close to a hundred at z = 1. This implies that there is no relation between HI gas and star formation in high redshift galaxies. The HI gas must be linked to cosmological gas accretion processes at high redshifts.
Several observed spectral properties of quasars are believed to be influenced by quasar orientation. In this investigation we examine the effect of orientation on the Mg II line located at 2798 {AA} in a sample of 36 radio-loud quasars, with orientation angles having been obtained in a previous study using radio observations. We find no significant relationship between orientation angle and either Mg II line full-width at half-maximum or equivalent width. The lack of correlation with inclination angle contradicts previous studies which also use radio data as a proxy for inclination angle and suggests the Mg II emission region does not occupy a disk-like geometry. The lack of correlation with Mg II equivalent width, however, is reported in at least one previous study. Although the significance is not very strong (86 percent), there is a possible negative relationship between inclination angle and Fe II strength which, if true, could explain the Fe II anti-correlation with [O III ] strength associated with Eigenvector 1. Interestingly, there are objects having almost edge-on inclinations while still exhibiting broad lines. This could be explained by a torus which is either clumpy (allowing sight lines to the central engine) or mis-aligned with the accretion disk.