No Arabic abstract
We study the relationship between stellar mass, star formation rate (SFR),ionization state, and gas-phase metallicity for a sample of 41 normal star-forming galaxies at $3 lesssim z lesssim 3.7$. The gas-phase oxygen abundance, ionization parameter, and electron density of ionized gas are derived from rest-frame optical strong emission lines measured on near-infrared spectra obtained with Keck/MOSFIRE. We remove the effect of these strong emission lines in the broad-band fluxes to compute stellar masses via spectral energy distribution fitting, while the SFR is derived from the dust-corrected ultraviolet luminosity. The ionization parameter is weakly correlated with the specific SFR, but otherwise the ionization parameter and electron density do not correlate with other global galaxy properties such as stellar mass, SFR, and metallicity. The mass-metallicity relation (MZR) at $zsimeq3.3$ shows lower metallicity by $simeq 0.7$ dex than that at $z=0$ at the same stellar mass. Our sample shows an offset by $simeq 0.3$ dex from the locally defined mass-metallicity-SFR relation, indicating that simply extrapolating such relation to higher redshift may predict an incorrect evolution of MZR. Furthermore, within the uncertainties we find no SFR-metallicity correlation, suggesting a less important role of SFR in controlling the metallicity at high redshift. We finally investigate the redshift evolution of the MZR by using the model by Lilly et al. (2013), finding that the observed evolution from $z=0$ to $zsimeq3.3$ can be accounted for by the model assuming a weak redshift evolution of the star formation efficiency.
We investigate the properties (e.g. star formation rate, dust attentuation, stellar mass and metallicity) of a sample of infrared luminous galaxies at z sim 1 via near-IR spectroscopy with Subaru-FMOS. Our sample consists of Herschel SPIRE and Spitzer MIPS selected sources in the COSMOS field with photometric redshifts in the range 0.7 < z-phot < 1.8, which have been targeted in 2 pointings (0.5 sq. deg.) with FMOS. We find a modest success rate for emission line detections, with candidate H{alpha} emission lines detected for 57 of 168 SPIRE sources (34 per cent). By stacking the near-IR spectra we directly measure the mean Balmer decrement for the H{alpha} and H{beta} lines, finding a value of <E(B-V)> = 0.51pm0.27 for <LIR> = 10^12 Lsol sources at <z> = 1.36. By comparing star formation rates estimated from the IR and from the dust uncorrected H{alpha} line we find a strong relationship between dust attenuation and star formation rate. This relation is broadly consistent with that previously seen in star-forming galaxies at z ~ 0.1. Finally, we investigate the metallicity via the N2 ratio, finding that z ~ 1 IR-selected sources are indistinguishable from the local mass-metallicity relation. We also find a strong correlation between dust attentuation and metallicity, with the most metal-rich IR-sources experiencing the largest levels of dust attenuation.
We present adaptive optics assisted integral field spectroscopy of 34 star-forming galaxies at $z$ = 0.8-3.3 selected from the HiZELS narrow-band survey. We measure the kinematics of the ionised interstellar medium on $sim$1 kpc scales, and show that the galaxies are turbulent, with a median ratio of rotational to dispersion support of $v$/$sigma$=0.82$pm$0.13. We combine the dynamics with high-resolution rest-frame optical imaging and extract emission line rotation curves. We show that high-redshift star-forming galaxies follow a similar power-law trend in specific angular momentum with stellar mass as that of local late type galaxies. We exploit the high resolution of our data and examine the radial distribution of angular momentum within each galaxy by constructing total angular momentum profiles. Although the stellar mass of a typical star-forming galaxy is expected to grow by a factor $sim$8 in the $sim$5 Gyrs between $z$$sim$3.3 and $z$$sim$0.8, we show that the internal distribution of angular momentum becomes less centrally concentrated in this period i.e the angular momentum grows outwards. To interpret our observations, we exploit the EAGLE simulation and trace the angular momentum evolution of star forming galaxies from $z$$sim$3 to $z$$sim$0, identifying a similar trend of decreasing angular momentum concentration. This change is attributed to a combination of gas accretion in the outer disk, and feedback that preferentially arises from the central regions of the galaxy. We discuss how the combination of the growing bulge and angular momentum stabilises the disk and gives rise to the Hubble sequence.
We conducted sub-millimeter observations with the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (ALMA) of star-forming galaxies at $zsim3.3$, whose gas-phase metallicities have been previously measured. We investigate the dust and gas contents of the galaxies at $zsim3.3$ and study how galaxies are interacting with their circumgalactic/intergalactic medium at this epoch by probing their gas mass fractions and gas-phase metallicities. Single-band dust continuum emission tracing dust mass and the relation between the gas-phase metallicity and gas-to-dust mass ratio are used to estimate the gas masses. The estimated gas mass fractions and depletion timescales are $f_{rm gas}=$ 0.20-0.75 and $t_{rm dep}=$ 0.09-1.55 Gyr, respectively. Although the galaxies appear to tightly distribute around the star-forming main sequence at $zsim3.3$, both quantities show a wider spread at a fixed stellar mass than expected from the scaling relation, suggesting a large diversity of fundamental gas properties among star-forming galaxies apparently on the main sequence. Comparing gas mass fraction and gas-phase metallicity between the star-forming galaxies at $zsim3.3$ and at lower redshifts, star-forming galaxies at $zsim3.3$ appear to be more metal-poor than local galaxies with similar gas mass fractions. Using the gas regulator model to interpret this offset, we find that it can be explained by a higher mass-loading factor, suggesting that the mass-loading factor in outflows increases at earlier cosmic times.
The complex structure of gas, metals, and dust in the interstellar and circumgalactic medium (ISM and CGM, respectively) in star-forming galaxies can be probed by Ly$alpha$ emission and absorption, low-ionization interstellar (LIS) metal absorption, and dust reddening E(B-V). We present a statistical analysis of the mutual correlations among Ly$alpha$ equivalent width (EW$_{Lyalpha}$), LIS equivalent width (EW$_{LIS}$), and E(B-V) in a sample of 157 star-forming galaxies at $zsim2.3$. With measurements obtained from individual, deep rest-UV spectra and spectral-energy distribution (SED) modeling, we find that the tightest correlation exists between EW$_{LIS}$ and E(B-V), although correlations among all three parameters are statistically significant. These results signal a direct connection between dust and metal-enriched HI gas, and that they are likely co-spatial. By comparing our results with the predictions of different ISM/CGM models, we favor a dusty ISM/CGM model where dust resides in HI gas clumps and Ly$alpha$ photons escape through the low HI covering fraction/column density intra-clump medium. Finally, we investigate the factors that potentially contribute to the intrinsic scatter in the correlations studied in this work, including metallicity, outflow kinematics, Ly$alpha$ production efficiency, and slit loss. Specifically, we find evidence that scatter in the relationship between EW$_{Lyalpha}$ and E(B-V) reflects the variation in metal-to-HI covering fraction ratio as a function of metallicity, and the effects of outflows on the porosity of the ISM/CGM. Future simulations incorporating star-formation feedback and the radiative transfer of Ly$alpha$ photons will provide key constraints on the spatial distributions of neutral hydrogen gas and dust in the ISM/CGM structure.
We present the serendipitous ALMA detection of a faint submillimeter galaxy (SMG) lensed by a foreground z~1 galaxy. By optimizing the source detection to deblend the system, we accurately build the full spectral energy distribution of the distant galaxy from the I814 band to radio wavelengths. It is extremely red, with a I-K colour larger than 2.5. We estimate a photometric redshift of 3.28 and determine the physical parameters. The distant galaxy turns out to be magnified by the foreground lens by a factor of ~1.5, which implies an intrinsic Ks-band magnitude of ~24.5, a submillimeter flux at 870um of ~2.5 mJy and a SFR of ~150-300Msun/yr, depending on the adopted tracer. These values place our source towards the faint end of the distribution of observed SMGs, and in particular among the still few faint SMGs with a fully characterized spectral energy distribution, which allows us not only to accurately estimate its redshift but also to measure its stellar mass and other physical properties. The galaxy studied in this work is a representative of the population of faint SMGs, of which only few objects are known to date, that are undetected in optical and therefore are not typically accounted for when measuring the cosmic star formation history (SFH). This faint galaxy population thus likely represents an important and missing piece in our understanding of the cosmic SFH. Its observation and characterization is of major importance to achieve a solid picture of galaxy evolution.