No Arabic abstract
We present UV luminosity functions of dropout galaxies at $zsim6-10$ with the complete Hubble Frontier Fields data. We obtain a catalog of $sim450$ dropout-galaxy candidates (350, 66, and 40 at $zsim6-7$, 8, and 9, respectively), whose UV absolute magnitudes reach $sim-14$ mag, $sim2$ mag deeper than the Hubble Ultra Deep Field detection limits. We carefully evaluate number densities of the dropout galaxies by Monte-Carlo simulations, including all lensing effects such as magnification, distortion, and multiplication of images as well as detection completeness and contamination effects in a self-consistent manner. We find that UV luminosity functions at $zsim6-8$ have steep faint-end slopes, $alphasim-2$, and likely steeper slopes, $alphalesssim-2$ at $zsim9-10$. We also find that the evolution of UV luminosity densities shows a non-accelerated decline beyond $zsim8$ in the case of $M_mathrm{trunc}=-15$, while an accelerated in the case of $M_mathrm{trunc}=-17$. We examine whether our results are consistent with the Thomson scattering optical depth from the Planck satellite and the ionized hydrogen fraction $Q_mathrm{HII}$ at $zlesssim7$ based on the standard analytic reionization model. We find that there exist reionizaiton scenarios that consistently explain all the observational measurements with the allowed parameters of $f_{rm esc}=0.17^{+0.07}_{-0.03}$ and $M_mathrm{trunc}>-14.0$ for $logxi_mathrm{ion}/[mathrm{erg}^{-1} mathrm{Hz}]=25.34$, where $f_{rm esc}$ is the escape fraction, $M_mathrm{trunc}$ is the faint limit of the UV luminosity function, and $xi_mathrm{ion}$ is the conversion factor of the UV luminosity to the ionizing photon emission rate. The length of the reionization period is estimated to be $Delta z=3.9^{+2.0}_{-1.6}$ (for $0.1<Q_mathrm{HII}<0.99$), consistent with the recent estimate from Planck.
We present the comprehensive analyses of faint dropout galaxies up to $zsim10$ with the first full-depth data set of Abell 2744 lensing cluster and parallel fields observed by the Hubble Frontier Fields (HFF) program. We identify $54$ dropouts at $zsim5-10$ in the HFF fields, and enlarge the size of $zsim9$ galaxy sample obtained to date. Although the number of highly magnified ($musim10$) galaxies is small due to the tiny survey volume of strong lensing, our study reaches the galaxies intrinsic luminosities comparable to the deepest-field HUDF studies. We derive UV luminosity functions with these faint dropouts, carefully evaluating the combination of observational incompleteness and lensing effects in the image plane by intensive simulations including magnification, distortion, and multiplication of images, with the evaluations of mass model dependences. Our results confirm that the faint-end slope, $alpha$, is as steep as $-2$ at $zsim6-8$, and strengthen the evidence of the rapid decrease of UV luminosity densities, $rho_mathrm{UV}$, at $z>8$ from the large $zsim9$ sample. We examine whether the rapid $rho_mathrm{UV}$ decrease trend can reconcile with the large Thomson scattering optical depth, $tau_mathrm{e}$, measured by CMB experiments allowing a large space of free parameters such as average ionizing photon escape fraction and stellar-population dependent conversion factor. No parameter set can reproduce both the rapid $rho_mathrm{UV}$ decrease and the large $tau_mathrm{e}$. It is possible that the $rho_mathrm{UV}$ decrease moderates at $zgtrsim11$, that the free parameters significantly evolve towards high-$z$, or that there exist additional sources of reionization such as X-ray binaries and faint AGNs.
We present the rest-1500AA UV luminosity functions (LF) for star-forming galaxies during the cosmic textit{high noon} -- the peak of cosmic star formation rate at $1.5<z<3$. We use deep NUV imaging data obtained as part of the textit{Hubble} Ultra-Violet Ultra Deep Field (UVUDF) program, along with existing deep optical and NIR coverage on the HUDF. We select F225W, F275W and F336W dropout samples using the Lyman break technique, along with samples in the corresponding redshift ranges selected using photometric redshifts and measure the rest-frame UV LF at $zsim1.7,2.2,3.0$ respectively, using the modified maximum likelihood estimator. We perform simulations to quantify the survey and sample incompleteness for the UVUDF samples to correct the effective volume calculations for the LF. We select galaxies down to $M_{UV}=-15.9,-16.3,-16.8$ and fit a faint-end slope of $alpha=-1.20^{+0.10}_{-0.13}, -1.32^{+0.10}_{-0.14}, -1.39^{+0.08}_{-0.12}$ at $1.4<z<1.9$, $1.8<z<2.6$, and $2.4<z<3.6$, respectively. We compare the star formation properties of $zsim2$ galaxies from these UV observations with results from Halpha and UV$+$IR observations. We find a lack of high SFR sources in the UV LF compared to the Halpha and UV$+$IR, likely due to dusty SFGs not being properly accounted for by the generic $IRX-beta$ relation used to correct for dust. We compute a volume-averaged UV-to-Halpha ratio by textit{abundance matching} the rest-frame UV LF and Halpha LF. We find an increasing UV-to-Halpha ratio towards low mass galaxies ($M_star lesssim 5times10^9$ M$_odot$). We conclude that this could be due to a larger contribution from starbursting galaxies compared to the high-mass end.
We present the results of a new search for galaxies at redshift z ~ 9 in the first two Hubble Frontier Fields with completed HST WFC3/IR and ACS imaging. To ensure robust photometric redshift solutions, and to minimize incompleteness, we confine our search to objects with H_{160} < 28.6 (AB mag), consider only image regions with an rms noise sigma_{160} > 30 mag (within a 0.5-arcsec diameter aperture), and insist on detections in both H_{160} and J_{140}. The result is a survey covering an effective area (after accounting for magnification) of 10.9 sq. arcmin, which yields 12 galaxies at 8.4 < z < 9.5. Within the Abell-2744 cluster and parallel fields we confirm the three brightest objects reported by Ishigaki et al. (2014), but recover only one of the four z > 8.4 sources reported by Zheng et al. (2014). In the MACSJ0416.1-240 cluster field we report five objects, and explain why each of these eluded detection or classification as z ~ 9 galaxies in the published searches of the shallower CLASH data. Finally, we uncover four z ~ 9 galaxies from the previously unsearched MACSJ0416.1-240 parallel field. Based on the published magnification maps we find that only one of these 12 galaxies is likely boosted by more than a factor of two by gravitational lensing. Consequently we are able to perform a fairly straightforward reanalysis of the normalization of the z ~ 9 UV galaxy luminosity function as explored previously in the HUDF12 programme. We conclude that the new data strengthen the evidence for a continued smooth decline in UV luminosity density (and hence star-formation rate density) from z ~ 8 to z ~ 9, contrary to recent reports of a marked drop-off at these redshifts. This provides further support for the scenario in which early galaxy evolution is sufficiently extended to explain cosmic reionization.
The deep, wide-area (~800-900 arcmin**2) near-infrared/WFC3/IR + Spitzer/IRAC observations over the CANDELS fields have been a remarkable resource for constraining the bright end of high redshift UV luminosity functions (LFs). However, the lack of HST 1.05-micron observations over the CANDELS fields has made it difficult to identify z~9-10 sources robustly, since such data are needed to confirm the presence of an abrupt Lyman break at 1.2 microns. We report here on the successful identification of many such z~9-10 sources from a new HST program (z9-CANDELS) that targets the highest-probability z~9-10 galaxy candidates with observations at 1.05 microns, to search for a robust Lyman-break at 1.2 microns. The potential z~9-10 candidates are preselected from the full HST, Spitzer/IRAC S-CANDELS observations, and the deepest-available ground-based optical+near-infrared observations. We identified 15 credible z~9-10 galaxies over the CANDELS fields. Nine of these galaxies lie at z~9 and 5 are new identifications. Our targeted follow-up strategy has proven to be very efficient in making use of scarce HST time to secure a reliable sample of z~9-10 galaxies. Through extensive simulations, we replicate the selection process for our sample (both the preselection and follow-up) and use it to improve current estimates for the volume density of bright z~9 and z~10 galaxies. The volume densities we find are 5(-2)(+3)x and 8(-3)(+9)x lower, respectively, than found at z~8. When compared with the best-fit evolution (i.e., dlog_{10} rho(UV)/dz=-0.29+/-0.02) in the UV luminosities densities from z~8 to z~4 integrated to 0.3L*(z=3) (-20 mag), these luminosity densities are 2.6(-0.9)(+1.5)x and 2.2(-1.1)(+2.0)x lower, respectively, than the extrapolated trends. Our new results are broadly consistent with the accelerated evolution scenario at z>8, as seen in many theoretical models.
We present the largest-ever sample of 79 Ly$alpha$ emitters (LAEs) at $zsim$ 7.0 selected in the COSMOS and CDFS fields of the LAGER project (the Lyman Alpha Galaxies in the Epoch of Reionization). Our newly amassed ultradeep narrowband exposure and deeper/wider broadband images have more than doubled the number of LAEs in COSMOS, and we have selected 30 LAEs in the second field CDFS. We detect two large-scale LAE-overdense regions in the COSMOS that are likely protoclusters at the highest redshift to date. We perform injection and recovery simulations to derive the sample incompleteness. We show significant incompleteness comes from blending with foreground sources, which however has not been corrected in LAE luminosity functions in {the} literature. The bright end bump in the Ly$alpha$ luminosity function in COSMOS is confirmed with 6 (2 newly selected) luminous LAEs (L$_{Lyalpha}$ $>$ 10$^{43.3}$ erg s$^{-1}$). Interestingly, the bump is absent in CDFS, in which only one luminous LAE is detected. Meanwhile, the faint end luminosity functions from the two fields well agree with each other. The 6 luminous LAEs in COSMOS coincide with 2 LAE-overdense regions, while such regions are not seen in CDFS. The bright-end luminosity function bump could be attributed to ionized bubbles in a patchy reionization. It appears associated with cosmic overdensities, thus supports an inside-out reionization topology at $z$ $sim$ 7.0, i.e., the high density peaks were ionized earlier compared to the voids. An average neutral hydrogen fraction of $x_{HI}$ $sim$ 0.2 -- 0.4 is derived at $zsim$ 7.0 based on the cosmic evolution of the Ly$alpha$ luminosity function.