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I. Paris

Publications and source records attributed to I. Paris.

11 recordsLinked to original sources
arXiv2016

WEAVE-QSO: A Massive Intergalactic Medium Survey for the William Herschel Telescope

In these proceedings we describe the WEAVE-QSO survey, which will observe around 400,000 high redshift quasars starting in 2018. This survey is part of a broader WEAVE survey to be conducted at the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope. We will focus on chiefly on the science goals, but will also briefly summarise the target selection methods anticipated and the expected survey plan. Understanding the apparent acceleration in the expansion of the Universe is one of the key scientific challenges of our time. Many experiments have been proposed to study this expansion, using a variety of techniques. Here we describe a survey that can measure this acceleration and therefore help elucidate the nature of dark energy: a survey of the Lyman-alpha forest (and quasar absorption in general) in spectra towards z>2 quasars (QSOs). Further constraints on neutrino masses and warm dark matter are also anticipated. The same data will also shed light on galaxy formation via study of the properties of inflowing/outflowing gas associated with nearby galaxies and in a cosmic web context. Gas properties are sensitive to density, temperature, UV radiation, metallicity and abundance pattern, and so constraint galaxy formation in a variety of ways. WEAVE-QSO will study absorbers with a dynamic range spanning more than 8 orders of magnitude in column density, their thermal broadening, and a host of elements and ionization species. A core principal of the WEAVE-QSO survey is the targeting of QSOs with near 100% efficiency principally through use of the J-PAS (r < 23.2) and Gaia (r < 20) data.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2016

XQ-100: A legacy survey of one hundred 3.5 < z < 4.5 quasars observed with VLT/XSHOOTER

We describe the execution and data reduction of the European Southern Observatory Large Programme "Quasars and their absorption lines: a legacy survey of the high-redshift universe with VLT/XSHOOTER" (hereafter `XQ-100'). XQ-100 has produced and made publicly available an homogeneous and high-quality sample of echelle spectra of 100 QSOs at redshifts z~3.5-4.5 observed with full spectral coverage from 315 to 2500 nm at a resolving power ranging from R~4000 to 7000, depending on wavelength. The median signal-to-noise ratios are 33, 25 and 43, as measured at rest-frame wavelengths 1700, 3000 and 3600 Angstrom, respectively. This paper provides future users of XQ-100 data with the basic statistics of the survey, along with details of target selection, data acquisition and data reduction. The paper accompanies the public release of all data products, including 100 reduced spectra. XQ-100 is the largest spectroscopic survey to date of high-redshift QSOs with simultaneous rest-frame UV/optical coverage, and as such enables a wide range of extragalactic research, from cosmology and galaxy evolution to AGN astrophysics.

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2014

The Dependence of C IV Broad Absorption Line Properties on Accompanying Si IV and Al III Absorption: Relating Quasar-Wind Ionization Levels, Kinematics, and Column Densities

We consider how the profile and multi-year variability properties of a large sample of C IV Broad Absorption Line (BAL) troughs change when BALs from Si IV and/or Al III are present at corresponding velocities, indicating that the line-of-sight intercepts at least some lower ionization gas. We derive a number of observational results for C IV BALs separated according to the presence or absence of accompanying lower ionization transitions, including measurements of composite profile shapes, equivalent width (EW), characteristic velocities, composite variation profiles, and EW variability. We also measure the correlations between EW and fractional-EW variability for C IV, Si IV, and Al III. Our measurements reveal the basic correlated changes between ionization level, kinematics, and column density expected in accretion-disk wind models; e.g., lines-of-sight including lower ionization material generally show deeper and broader C IV troughs that have smaller minimum velocities and that are less variable. Many C IV BALs with no accompanying Si IV or Al III BALs may have only mild or no saturation.

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2014

A connection between extremely strong Damped Lyman-alpha Systems and Lyman-alpha Emitting Galaxies at small impact parameters

We present a study of ~100 high redshift (z~2-4) extremely strong damped Lyman-alpha systems (ESDLA, with N(HI)>0.5x10^22 cm^-2) detected in quasar spectra from the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey SDSS-III DR11. We study the neutral hydrogen, metal, and dust content of this elusive population of absorbers and confirm our previous finding that the high column density end of the N(HI) frequency distribution has a relatively shallow slope with power-law index -3.6, similar to what is seen from 21-cm maps in nearby galaxies. The stacked absorption spectrum indicates a typical metallicity ~1/20th solar, similar to the mean metallicity of the overall DLA population. The relatively small velocity extent of the low-ionisation lines suggests that ESDLAs do not arise from large-scale flows of neutral gas. The high column densities involved are in turn more similar to what is seen in DLAs associated with gamma-ray burst afterglows (GRB-DLAs), which are known to occur close to star forming regions. This indicates that ESDLAs arise from lines of sight passing at very small impact parameters from the host galaxy, as observed in nearby galaxies. This is also supported by simple theoretical considerations and recent high-z hydrodynamical simulations. We strongly substantiate this picture by the first statistical detection of Lya emission with ~(0.6+/-0.2)x10^42 erg/s in the core of ESDLAs (corresponding to about 0.1 L* at z~2-3), obtained through stacking the fibre spectra (of radius 1" corresponding to ~8 kpc at z~2.5). [truncated]

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2013

Broad Absorption Line Variability on Multi-Year Timescales in a Large Quasar Sample

We present a detailed investigation of the variability of 428 C IV and 235 Si IV Broad Absorption Line (BAL) troughs identified in multi-epoch observations of 291 quasars by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-I/II/III. These observations primarily sample rest-frame timescales of 1-3 yr over which significant rearrangement of the BAL wind is expected. We derive a number of observational results on, e.g., the frequency of BAL variability, the velocity range over which BAL variability occurs, the primary observed form of BAL-trough variability, the dependence of BAL variability upon timescale, the frequency of BAL strengthening vs. weakening, correlations between BAL variability and BAL-trough profiles, relations between C IV and Si IV BAL variability, coordinated multi-trough variability, and BAL variations as a function of quasar properties. We assess implications of these observational results for quasar winds. Our results support models where most BAL absorption is formed within an order-of-magnitude of the wind-launching radius, although a significant minority of BAL troughs may arise on larger scales. We estimate an average lifetime for a BAL trough along our line-of-sight of a few thousand years. BAL disappearance and emergence events appear to be extremes of general BAL variability, rather than being qualitatively distinct phenomena. We derive the parameters of a random-walk model for BAL EW variability, finding that this model can acceptably describe some key aspects of EW variability. The coordinated trough variability of BAL quasars with multiple troughs suggests that changes in "shielding gas" may play a significant role in driving general BAL variability.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2013

Broad Absorption Line Quasars with Redshifted Troughs: High-Velocity Infall or Rotationally Dominated Outflows?

We report the discovery in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey of seventeen broad absorption line (BAL) quasars with high-ionization troughs that include absorption redshifted relative to the quasar rest frame. The redshifted troughs extend to velocities up to v=12,000 km/s and the trough widths exceed 3000 km/s in all but one case. Approximately 1 in 1000 BAL quasars with blueshifted C IV absorption also has redshifted C IV absorption; objects with C IV absorption present only at redshifted velocities are roughly four times rarer. In more than half of our objects, redshifted absorption is seen in C II or Al III as well as C IV, making low-ionization absorption at least ten times more common among BAL quasars with redshifted troughs than among standard BAL quasars. However, the C IV absorption equivalent widths in our objects are on average smaller than those of standard BAL quasars with low-ionization absorption. We consider several possible ways of generating redshifted absorption. The two most likely possibilities may be at work simultaneously, in the same objects or in different ones. Rotationally dominated outflows seen against a quasar's extended continuum source can produce redshifted and blueshifted absorption, but variability consistent with this scenario is seen in only one of the four objects with multiple spectra. The infall of relatively dense and low-ionization gas to radii as small as 400 Schwarzschild radii can in principle explain the observed range of trough profiles, but current models do not easily explain the origin and survival of such gas. Whatever the origin(s) of the absorbing gas in these objects, it must be located at small radii to explain its large redshifted velocities, and thus offers a novel probe of the inner regions of quasars.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2013

Luminosity Function from dedicated SDSS-III and MMT data of quasars in 0.7<z<4.0 selected with a new approach

We present a measurement of the quasar luminosity function in the range 0.68 2.15. Using pure luminosity evolution models, we fitted our LF measurements, and predicted quasar number counts as a function of redshift and observed magnitude. These predictions are useful inputs for future cosmology surveys such as those relying on the observation of quasars to measure baryon acoustic oscillations.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2011

Simulations of BAO reconstruction with a quasar Lyman-alpha survey

The imprint of Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) on the matter power spectrum can be constrained using the neutral hydrogen density in the intergalactic medium as a tracer of the matter density. One of the goals of the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-III) is to derive the Hubble expansion rate and the angular scale from the BAO signal in the IGM. To this aim, the Lyman-alpha forest of 10^5 quasars will be observed in the redshift range 2.2<z<3.5 and over 10,000 deg^2. We simulated the BOSS QSO survey to estimate the statistical accuracy on the BAO scale determination provided by such a large scale survey. In particular, we discuss the effect of the poorly constrained estimate of the unabsorbed intrinsic quasar spectrum. The volume of current N-body simulations being too small for such studies, we resorted to Gaussian random field (GRF) simulations. We validated the use of GRFs by comparing the output of GRF simulations with that of the Horizon N-body simulation with the same initial conditions. Realistic mock samples of QSO Lyman-αforest were generated; their power spectrum was computed and fitted to obtain the BAO scale. The rms of the results for 100 different simulations provides an estimate of the statistical error expected from the BOSS survey. We confirm the results from Fisher matrix estimate. In the absence of error on the unabsorbed quasar spectrum, the BOSS quasar survey should measure the BAO scale with an error of the order of 2.3%, or the transverse and radial BAO scales separately with errors of the order of 6.8% and 3.9%, respectively. The significance of the BAO detection is assessed by an average Δχ^2=17 but for individual realizations Δχ^2 ranges from 2 t o 35. The error on the unabsorbed quasar spectrum increases the error on the BAO scale by 10 to 20% and results in a sub percent bias.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2011

Variability selected high-redshift quasars on SDSS Stripe 82

The SDSS-III BOSS Quasar survey will attempt to observe z>2.15 quasars at a density of at least 15 per square degree to yield the first measurement of the Baryon Acoustic Oscillations in the Ly-alpha forest. To help reaching this goal, we have developed a method to identify quasars based on their variability in the u g r i z optical bands. The method has been applied to the selection of quasar targets in the SDSS region known as Stripe 82 (the Southern equatorial stripe), where numerous photometric observations are available over a 10-year baseline. This area was observed by BOSS during September and October 2010. Only 8% of the objects selected via variability are not quasars, while 90% of the previously identified high-redshift quasar population is recovered. The method allows for a significant increase in the z>2.15 quasar density over previous strategies based on optical (ugriz) colors, achieving a density of 24.0 deg^{-2} on average down to g~22 over the 220 deg^2 area of Stripe 82. We applied this method to simulated data from the Palomar Transient Factory and from Pan-STARRS, and showed that even with data that have sparser time sampling than what is available in Stripe 82, including variability in future quasar selection strategies would lead to increased target selection efficiency in the z>2.15 redshift range. We also found that Broad Absorption Line quasars are preferentially present in a variability than in a color selection.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2009

QSO Selection and Photometric Redshifts with Neural Networks

Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) and their effects on the matter power spectrum can be studied by using the Lyman-alpha absorption signature of the matter density field along quasar (QSO) lines of sight. A measurement sufficiently accurate to provide useful cosmological constraints requires the observation of ~100000 quasars in the redshift range 2.2<z<3.5 over ~8000 deg2. Such a survey is planned by the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) project of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-III).In practice, one needs a stellar rejection of more than two orders of magnitude with a selection efficiency for quasars better than 50% up to magnitudes as large as g ~ 22. To obtain an appropriate target list and estimate quasar redshifts, we have developed an Artificial Neural Networks (NN) with a multilayer perceptron architecture. The input variables are photometric measurements, i.e. the object magnitudes and their errors in the five bands (ugriz) of the SDSS photometry. For target selection, we achieve a non-quasar point-like object rejection of 99.6% and 98.5% for a quasar efficiency of, respectively, 50% and 85%. The photometric redshift precision is of the order of 0.1 over the region relevant for BAO studies.

astro-ph.CO↗