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arXiv · 2611.08594

Constraining Dust Attenuation Curves in Star-Forming Galaxies at Cosmic Noon Using Multiple Emission Line Ratios

Owen Zafuta·Joseph Havens·Bren E. Backhaus·Allison Kirkpatrick·Gregory Troiani·Kurt Hamblin
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Abstract

Dust attenuation remains a dominant systematic uncertainty in measurements of an emission line, and therefore galaxies properties derived from the emission lines such as star formation rates. Corrections based only on the Balmer decrement require an assumed attenuation-curve slope, even though that slope varies among galaxies. We use JWST/NIRSpec spectroscopy from JADES to constrain effective dust attenuation curves for 386 star-forming galaxies at $0.5\leq z\leq7$. For each galaxy, we combine H$α$, H$β$, and one additional hydrogen recombination line and solve for the normalization $τ_V$ and slope $n$ of a power-law attenuation curve, allowing the slope to vary from galaxy to galaxy. We found slopes and normalization span a broad range even for galaxies at similar redshifts. Additionally, our method using Paschen transitions provided substantially greater constraints the attenuation-curve slope than Balmer-only combinations. When comparing to SMC-like or Calzetti-like corrections we find our method produces more consistent star formation rates with less scatter. These improved dust corrections provide an avenue to better describe star formation rates in the epoch of peak star formation and the early universe.

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Owen Zafuta, Joseph Havens, Bren E. Backhaus, Allison Kirkpatrick, Gregory Troiani, Kurt Hamblin. 2026-11-05. Constraining Dust Attenuation Curves in Star-Forming Galaxies at Cosmic Noon Using Multiple Emission Line Ratios. https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.08594

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