arXiv subjects

Nima Chartab

Publications and source records attributed to Nima Chartab.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Fraction of Clumpy Star-Forming Galaxies at $0.5\leq z\leq 3$ in UVCANDELS: Dependence on Stellar Mass and Environment

High-resolution imaging of galaxies in rest-frame UV has revealed the existence of giant star-forming clumps prevalent in high redshift galaxies. Studying these sub-structures provides important information about their formation and evolution and informs theoretical galaxy evolution models. We present a new method to identify clumps in galaxies' high-resolution rest-frame UV images. Using imaging data from CANDELS and UVCANDELS, we identify star-forming clumps in an HST/F160W$\leq 25$ AB mag sample of 6767 galaxies at $0.5\leq z\leq 3$ in four fields, GOODS-N, GOODS-S, EGS, and COSMOS. We use a low-pass band filter in Fourier space to reconstruct the background image of a galaxy and detect small-scale features (clumps) on the background-subtracted image. Clumpy galaxies are defined as those having at least one off-center clump that contributes a minimum of 10$\%$ of the galaxy's total rest-frame UV flux. We measure the fraction of clumpy galaxies ($\rm f_{clumpy}$) as a function of stellar mass, redshift, and galaxy environment. Our results indicate that $\rm f_{clumpy}$ increases with redshift, reaching $\sim 65\%$ at $z\sim 1.5$. We also find that $\rm f_{clumpy}$ in low-mass galaxies ($\rm 9.5\leq log(M_*/M_\odot)\leq 10$) is 10$\%$ higher compared to that of their high-mass counterparts ($\rm log(M_*/M_\odot)>10.5$). Moreover, we find no evidence of significant environmental dependence of $\rm f_{clumpy}$ for galaxies at the redshift range of this study. Our results suggest that the fragmentation of gas clouds under violent disk instability remains the primary driving mechanism for clump formation, and incidents common in dense environments, such as mergers, are not the dominant processes.

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arXiv2023

Introducing the Texas Euclid Survey for Lyman Alpha (TESLA) Survey: Initial Study Correlating Galaxy Properties to Lyman-Alpha Emission

We present the Texas Euclid Survey for Lyman-Alpha (TESLA), a spectroscopic survey in the 10 square degree of the Euclid North Ecliptic Pole (NEP) field. Using TESLA, we study how the physical properties of Lyman-alpha emitters (LAEs) correlate with Lyman-alpha emission to understand the escape of Lyman alpha from galaxies at redshifts 2 -- 3.5. We present an analysis of 43 LAEs performed in the NEP field using early data from the TESLA survey. We use Subaru Hyper Suprime-Cam imaging in the grizy-bands, Spitzer/IRAC channels 1 and 2 from the Hawaii 20 square degree (H20) survey and spectra acquired by the Visible Integral-Field Replicable Unit Spectrograph (VIRUS) on the Hobby-Eberly Telescope. We perform spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting to compute the galaxy properties of 43 LAEs, and study correlations between stellar mass, star formation rate (SFR), and dust, to the Lyman-alpha rest-frame equivalent widths (EW). We uncover marginal (1 sigma significance) correlations between stellar mass and Lyman-alpha EW, and star formation rate (SFR) and Lyman-alpha EW, with a Spearman correlation coefficient of -0.$34_{-.14}^{+.17}$ and -0.$37_{-.14}^{+.16}$ respectively. We show that the Lyman-alpha distribution of the 43 LAEs is consistent with being drawn from an exponential distribution with an e-folding scale of 150 Angstrom. Once complete the TESLA survey will enable the study of ~ thousands of LAEs to explore correlations between galaxy properties and Lyman-alpha EW. The large sample size will allow the construction of a predictive model for the Lyman-alpha EW as a function of SED-derived galaxy properties, which could be used to improve Lyman-alpha based constraints on reionization.

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arXiv2023

COSMOS-Web: An Overview of the JWST Cosmic Origins Survey

We present the survey design, implementation, and outlook for COSMOS-Web, a 255 hour treasury program conducted by the James Webb Space Telescope in its first cycle of observations. COSMOS-Web is a contiguous 0.54 deg$^2$ NIRCam imaging survey in four filters (F115W, F150W, F277W, and F444W) that will reach 5$σ$ point source depths ranging $\sim$27.5-28.2 magnitudes. In parallel, we will obtain 0.19 deg$^2$ of MIRI imaging in one filter (F770W) reaching 5$σ$ point source depths of $\sim$25.3-26.0 magnitudes. COSMOS-Web will build on the rich heritage of multiwavelength observations and data products available in the COSMOS field. The design of COSMOS-Web is motivated by three primary science goals: (1) to discover thousands of galaxies in the Epoch of Reionization ($6 4$ and place constraints on the formation of the Universe's most massive galaxies ($M_\star>10^{10}$\,M$_\odot$), and (3) directly measure the evolution of the stellar mass to halo mass relation using weak gravitational lensing out to $z\sim2.5$ and measure its variance with galaxies' star formation histories and morphologies. In addition, we anticipate COSMOS-Web's legacy value to reach far beyond these scientific goals, touching many other areas of astrophysics, such as the identification of the first direct collapse black hole candidates, ultracool sub-dwarf stars in the Galactic halo, and possibly the identification of $z>10$ pair-instability supernovae. In this paper we provide an overview of the survey's key measurements, specifications, goals, and prospects for new discovery.

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arXiv2023

Optimized Photometric Redshifts for the Cosmic Assembly Near-Infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey (CANDELS)

We present the first comprehensive release of photometric redshifts (photo-z's) from the Cosmic Assembly Near-Infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey (CANDELS) team. We use statistics based upon the Quantile-Quantile (Q--Q) plot to identify biases and signatures of underestimated or overestimated errors in photo-z probability density functions (PDFs) produced by six groups in the collaboration; correcting for these effects makes the resulting PDFs better match the statistical definition of a PDF. After correcting each group's PDF, we explore three methods of combining the different groups' PDFs for a given object into a consensus curve. Two of these methods are based on identifying the minimum f-divergence curve, i.e., the PDF that is closest in aggregate to the other PDFs in a set (analogous to the median of an array of numbers). We demonstrate that these techniques yield improved results using sets of spectroscopic redshifts independent of those used to optimize PDF modifications. The best photo-z PDFs and point estimates are achieved with the minimum f-divergence using the best 4 PDFs for each object (mFDa4) and the Hierarchical Bayesian (HB4) methods, respectively. The HB4 photo-z point estimates produced $σ_{\rm NMAD} = 0.0227/0.0189$ and $|Δz/(1+z)| > 0.15$ outlier fraction = 0.067/0.019 for spectroscopic and 3D-HST redshifts, respectively. Finally, we describe the structure and provide guidance for the use of the CANDELS photo-z catalogs, which are available at https://archive.stsci.edu/hlsp/candels.

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arXiv2022

The Art of Measuring Physical Parameters in Galaxies: A Critical Assessment of Spectral Energy Distribution Fitting Techniques

The study of galaxy evolution hinges on our ability to interpret multi-wavelength galaxy observations in terms of their physical properties. To do this, we rely on spectral energy distribution (SED) models which allow us to infer physical parameters from spectrophotometric data. In recent years, thanks to the wide and deep multi-waveband galaxy surveys, the volume of high quality data have significantly increased. Alongside the increased data, algorithms performing SED fitting have improved, including better modeling prescriptions, newer templates, and more extensive sampling in wavelength space. We present a comprehensive analysis of different SED fitting codes including their methods and output with the aim of measuring the uncertainties caused by the modeling assumptions. We apply fourteen of the most commonly used SED fitting codes on samples from the CANDELS photometric catalogs at z~1 and z~3. We find agreement on the stellar mass, while we observe some discrepancies in the star formation rate (SFR) and dust attenuation results. To explore the differences and biases among the codes, we explore the impact of the various modeling assumptions as they are set in the codes (e.g., star formation histories, nebular, dust, and AGN models) on the derived stellar masses, SFRs, and A_V values. We then assess the difference among the codes on the SFR-stellar mass relation and we measure the contribution to the uncertainties by the modeling choices (i.e., the modeling uncertainties) in stellar mass (~0.1dex), SFR (~0.3dex), and dust attenuation (~0.3mag). Finally, we present some resources summarizing best practices in SED fitting.

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arXiv2022

Evolution of Gas, and Star Formation from z = 0 to 5

ALMA observations of the long wavelength dust continuum are used to estimate the gas masses in a sample of 708 star-forming (SF) galaxies at z = 0.3 to 4.5. We determine the dependence of gas masses and star formation efficiencies (SFE=SFR per unit gass mass). We find that 70 percent of the increase in SFRs of the MS is due to the increased gas masses at earlier epochs while 30 percent is due to increased efficiency of SF. For galaxies above the MS this is reversed with 70 percent of the increased SFR relative to the MS being due to elevated SFEs. Thus, the major evolution of star formation activity at early epochs is driven by increased gas masses, while the starburst activity taking galaxies above the MS is due to enhanced triggering of star formation (likely due to galactic merging). The interstellar gas peaks at z = 2 and dominates the stellar mass down to z = 1.2. Accretion rates needed to maintain continuity of the MS evolution exceed 100 Msun per yr at z > 2. The galactic gas contents are likely the driving determinant for both the rise in SF and AGN activity from z = 5 to their peak at z = 2 and subsequent fall to lower z. We suggest that for self-gravitating clouds with supersonic turbulence, cloud collisions and the filamentary structure of the clouds regulate the star formation activity.

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arXiv2022

Investigating the Effect of Galaxy Interactions on Star Formation at 0.5<z<3.0

Observations and simulations of interacting galaxies and mergers in the local universe have shown that interactions can significantly enhance the star formation rates (SFR) and fueling of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). However, at higher redshift, some simulations suggest that the level of star formation enhancement induced by interactions is lower due to the higher gas fractions and already increased SFRs in these galaxies. To test this, we measure the SFR enhancement in a total of 2351 (1327) massive ($M_*>10^{10}M_\odot$) major ($1<M_1/M_2<4$) spectroscopic galaxy pairs at 0.5<z<3.0 with $ΔV <5000$ km s$^{-1}$ (1000 km s$^{-1}$) and projected separation <150 kpc selected from the extensive spectroscopic coverage in the COSMOS and CANDELS fields. We find that the highest level of SFR enhancement is a factor of 1.23$^{+0.08}_{-0.09}$ in the closest projected separation bin (<25 kpc) relative to a stellar mass-, redshift-, and environment-matched control sample of isolated galaxies. We find that the level of SFR enhancement is a factor of $\sim1.5$ higher at 0.5<z<1 than at 1<z<3 in the closest projected separation bin. Among a sample of visually identified mergers, we find an enhancement of a factor of 1.86$^{+0.29}_{-0.18}$ for coalesced systems. For this visually identified sample, we see a clear trend of increased SFR enhancement with decreasing projected separation (2.40$^{+0.62}_{-0.37}$ vs.\ 1.58$^{+0.29}_{-0.20}$ for 0.5<z<1.6 and 1.6<z<3.0, respectively). The SFR enhancement seen in our interactions and mergers are all lower than the level seen in local samples at the same separation, suggesting that the level of interaction-induced star formation evolves significantly over this time period.

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arXiv2022

A Machine Learning Approach to Predict Missing Flux Densities in Multi-band Galaxy Surveys

We present a new method based on information theory to find the optimal number of bands required to measure the physical properties of galaxies with a desired accuracy. As a proof of concept, using the recently updated COSMOS catalog (COSMOS2020), we identify the most relevant wavebands for measuring the physical properties of galaxies in a Hawaii Two-0 (H20)- and UVISTA-like survey for a sample of $i<25$ AB mag galaxies. We find that with available $i$-band fluxes, $r$, $u$, IRAC/$ch2$ and $z$ bands provide most of the information regarding the redshift with importance decreasing from $r$-band to $z$-band. We also find that for the same sample, IRAC/$ch2$, $Y$, $r$ and $u$ bands are the most relevant bands in stellar mass measurements with decreasing order of importance. Investigating the inter-correlation between the bands, we train a model to predict UVISTA observations in near-IR from H20-like observations. We find that magnitudes in $YJH$ bands can be simulated/predicted with an accuracy of $1σ$ mag scatter $\lesssim 0.2$ for galaxies brighter than 24 AB mag in near-IR bands. One should note that these conclusions depend on the selection criteria of the sample. For any new sample of galaxies with a different selection, these results should be remeasured. Our results suggest that in the presence of a limited number of bands, a machine learning model trained over the population of observed galaxies with extensive spectral coverage outperforms template-fitting. Such a machine learning model maximally comprises the information acquired over available extensive surveys and breaks degeneracies in the parameter space of template-fitting inevitable in the presence of a few bands.

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arXiv2022

Gas Phase Metallicities of Local Ultra-Luminous Infrared Galaxies Follow Normal Star-Forming Galaxies

Despite advances in observational data, theoretical models, and computational techniques to simulate key physical processes in the formation and evolution of galaxies, the stellar mass assembly of galaxies still remains an unsolved problem today. Optical spectroscopic measurements appear to show that the gas-phase metallicities of local ultra-luminous infrared galaxies (ULIRGs) are significantly lower than those of normal star-forming galaxies. This difference has resulted in the claim that ULIRGs are fueled by metal-poor gas accretion from the outskirts\cite{Mannucci10}. Here we report on a new set of gas-phase metallicity measurements making use of the far-infrared spectral lines of [O{\sc iii}]52 $μ$m, [O{\sc iii}]88 $μ$m, and [N{\sc iii}]57 $μ$m instead of the usual optical lines. Photoionization models have resulted in a metallicity diagnostic based on these three lines that break the electron density degeneracy and reduce the scatter of the correlation significantly. Using new data from SOFIA and archival data from Herschel Space Observatory, we find that local ULIRGs lie on the mass-metallicity relation of star-forming galaxies and have metallicities comparable to other galaxies with similar stellar masses and star formation rates. The lack of a departure suggests that ULIRGs follow the same mass assembly mechanism as luminous star-forming galaxies and $\sim 0.3$ dex under-abundance in metallicities derived from optical lines is a result of heavily obscured metal-rich gas which has a negligible effect when using the FIR line diagnostics.

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arXiv2021

Evidence for gas-phase metal deficiency in massive protocluster galaxies at z~2.2

We study the mass-metallicity relation for 19 members of a spectroscopically-confirmed protocluster in the COSMOS field at $z=2.2$ (CC2.2), and compare it with that of 24 similarly selected field galaxies at the same redshift. Both samples are $\rm Hα$ emitting sources, chosen from the HiZELS narrow-band survey, with metallicities derived from $\rm N2\ (\frac{\rm [NII] λ6584}{\rm H α})$ line ratio. For the mass-matched samples of protocluster and field galaxies, we find that protocluster galaxies with $10^{9.9} \rm M_\odot \leq M_* \leq 10^{10.9} \rm M_\odot$ are metal deficient by $0.10 \pm 0.04$ dex ($2.5σ$ significance) compared to their coeval field galaxies. This metal deficiency is absent for low mass galaxies, $\rm M_* < 10^{9.9} \rm M_\odot$. Moreover, relying on both SED-derived and $\rm {Hα}$ (corrected for dust extinction based on $\rm {M_*}$) SFRs, we find no strong environmental dependence of SFR-$\rm {M_*}$ relation, however, we are not able to rule out the existence of small dependence due to inherent uncertainties in both SFR estimators. The existence of $2.5σ$ significant metal deficiency for massive protocluster galaxies favors a model in which funneling of the primordial cold gas through filaments dilutes the metal content of protoclusters at high redshifts ($z \gtrsim 2$). At these redshifts, gas reservoirs in filaments are dense enough to cool down rapidly and fall into the potential well of the protocluster to lower the gas-phase metallicity of galaxies. Moreover, part of this metal deficiency could be originated from galaxy interactions which are more prevalent in dense environments.

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arXiv2021

The MOSDEF Survey: Environmental dependence of the gas-phase metallicity of galaxies at $1.4 \leq z \leq 2.6$

Using the near-IR spectroscopy of the MOSFIRE Deep Evolution Field (MOSDEF) survey, we investigate the role of local environment in the gas-phase metallicity of galaxies. The local environment measurements are derived from accurate and uniformly calculated photometric redshifts with well-calibrated probability distributions. Based on rest-frame optical emission lines, [NII]$\lambda6584$ and H$α$, we measure gas-phase oxygen abundance of 167 galaxies at $1.37\leq z\leq1.7$ and 303 galaxies at $2.09\leq z\leq2.61$, located in diverse environments. We find that at $z\sim1.5$, the average metallicity of galaxies in overdensities with $M_*\sim10^{9.8}M_\odot, 10^{10.2}M_\odot$ and $10^{10.8}M_\odot$ is higher relative to their field counterparts by $0.094\pm0.051$, $0.068\pm0.028$ and $0.052\pm0.043$ dex, respectively. However, this metallicity enhancement does not exist at higher redshift, $z\sim2.3$, where, compared to the field galaxies, we find $0.056\pm0.043$, $0.056\pm0.028$ and $0.096\pm 0.034$ dex lower metallicity for galaxies in overdense environments with $M_*\sim10^{9.8}M_\odot, 10^{10.2}M_\odot$ and $10^{10.7}M_\odot$, respectively. Our results suggest that, at $1.37\leq z\leq2.61$, the variation of mass-metallicity relation with local environment is small ($<0.1$dex), and reverses at $z\sim2$. Our results support the hypothesis that, at the early stages of cluster formation, owing to efficient gas cooling, galaxies residing in overdensities host a higher fraction of pristine gas with prominent primordial gas accretion, which lowers their gas-phase metallicity compared to their coeval field galaxies. However, as the Universe evolves to lower redshifts ($z\lesssim2$), shock-heated gas in overdensities cannot cool down efficiently, and galaxies become metal-rich rapidly due to the suppression of pristine gas inflow and re-accretion of metal-enriched outflows in overdensities.

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arXiv2021

Comparison of Observed Galaxy Properties with Semianalytic Model Predictions using Machine Learning

With current and upcoming experiments such as WFIRST, Euclid and LSST, we can observe up to billions of galaxies. While such surveys cannot obtain spectra for all observed galaxies, they produce galaxy magnitudes in color filters. This data set behaves like a high-dimensional nonlinear surface, an excellent target for machine learning. In this work, we use a lightcone of semianalytic galaxies tuned to match CANDELS observations from Lu et al. (2014) to train a set of neural networks on a set of galaxy physical properties. We add realistic photometric noise and use trained neural networks to predict stellar masses and average star formation rates on real CANDELS galaxies, comparing our predictions to SED fitting results. On semianalytic galaxies, we are nearly competitive with template-fitting methods, with biases of $0.01$ dex for stellar mass, $0.09$ dex for star formation rate, and $0.04$ dex for metallicity. For the observed CANDELS data, our results are consistent with template fits on the same data at $0.15$ dex bias in $M_{\rm star}$ and $0.61$ dex bias in star formation rate. Some of the bias is driven by SED-fitting limitations, rather than limitations on the training set, and some is intrinsic to the neural network method. Further errors are likely caused by differences in noise properties between the semianalytic catalogs and data. Our results show that galaxy physical properties can in principle be measured with neural networks at a competitive degree of accuracy and precision to template-fitting methods.

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arXiv2020

Dependence of the IRX-$β$ dust attenuation relation on metallicity and environment

We use a sample of star-forming field and protocluster galaxies at z=2.0-2.5 with Keck/MOSFIRE K-band spectra, a wealth of rest-frame UV photometry, and Spitzer/MIPS and Herschel/PACS observations, to dissect the relation between the ratio of IR to UV luminosity (IRX) versus UV slope ($β$) as a function of gas-phase metallicity (12+log(O/H)~8.2-8.7). We find no significant dependence of the IRX-$β$ trend on environment. However, we find that at a given $β$, IRX is highly correlated with metallicity, and less correlated with mass, age, and sSFR. We conclude that, of the physical properties tested here, metallicity is the primary physical cause of the IRX-$β$ scatter, and the IRX correlation with mass is presumably due to the mass dependence on metallicity. Our results indicate that the UV attenuation curve steepens with decreasing metallicity, and spans the full range of slope possibilities from a shallow Calzetti-type curve for galaxies with the highest metallicity in our sample (12+log(O/H)~8.6) to a steep SMC-like curve for those with 12+log(O/H)~8.3. Using a Calzetti (SMC) curve for the low (high) metallicity galaxies can lead to up to a factor of 3 overestimation (underestimation) of the UV attenuation and obscured SFR. We speculate that this change is due to different properties of dust grains present in the ISM of low- and high-metallicity galaxies.

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arXiv2020

Investigating the Effect of Galaxy Interactions on AGN Enhancement at $0.5<z<3.0$

Galaxy interactions and mergers are thought to play an important role in the evolution of galaxies. Studies in the nearby universe show a higher AGN fraction in interacting and merging galaxies than their isolated counterparts, indicating that such interactions are important contributors to black hole growth. To investigate the evolution of this role at higher redshifts, we have compiled the largest known sample of major spectroscopic galaxy pairs (2381 with $ΔV <5000$ km s$^{-1}$) at $0.5<z<3.0$ from observations in the COSMOS and CANDELS surveys. We identify X-ray and IR AGN among this kinematic pair sample, a visually identified sample of mergers and interactions, and a mass-, redshift-, and environment-matched control sample for each in order to calculate AGN fractions and the level of AGN enhancement as a function of relative velocity, redshift, and X-ray luminosity. While we see a slight increase in AGN fraction with decreasing projected separation, overall, we find no significant enhancement relative to the control sample at any separation. In the closest projected separation bin ($<25$ kpc, $ΔV <1000$ km s$^{-1}$), we find enhancements of a factor of 0.94$^{+0.21}_{-0.16}$ and 1.00$^{+0.58}_{-0.31}$ for X-ray and IR-selected AGN, respectively. While we conclude that galaxy interactions do not significantly enhance AGN activity on average over $0.5<z<3.0$ at these separations, given the errors and the small sample size at the closest projected separations, our results would be consistent with the presence of low-level AGN enhancement.

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arXiv2020

Spectroscopic Confirmation of a Coma Cluster Progenitor at z ~ 2.2

We report the spectroscopic confirmation of a new protocluster in the COSMOS field at $z$ $\sim$ 2.2, COSMOS Cluster 2.2 (CC2.2), originally identified as an overdensity of narrowband selected H$α$ emitting candidates. With only two masks of Keck/MOSFIRE near-IR spectroscopy in both $H$ ($\sim$ 1.47-1.81 $μ$m) and $K$ ($\sim$ 1.92-2.40 $μ$m) bands ($\sim$ 1.5 hour each), we confirm 35 unique protocluster members with at least two emission lines detected with S/N $>$ 3. Combined with 12 extra members from the zCOSMOS-deep spectroscopic survey (47 in total), we estimate a mean redshift and a line-of-sight velocity dispersion of $z_{mean}$=2.23224 $\pm$ 0.00101 and $σ_{los}$=645 $\pm$ 69 km s$^{-1}$ for this protocluster, respectively. Assuming virialization and spherical symmetry for the system, we estimate a total mass of $M_{vir}$ $\sim$ $(1-2) \times$10$^{14}$ $M_{\odot}$ for the structure. We evaluate a number density enhancement of $δ_{g}$ $\sim$ 7 for this system and we argue that the structure is likely not fully virialized at $z$ $\sim$ 2.2. However, in a spherical collapse model, $δ_{g}$ is expected to grow to a linear matter enhancement of $\sim$ 1.9 by $z$=0, exceeding the collapse threshold of 1.69, and leading to a fully collapsed and virialized Coma-type structure with a total mass of $M_{dyn}$($z$=0) $\sim$ 9.2$\times$10$^{14}$ $M_{\odot}$ by now. This observationally efficient confirmation suggests that large narrowband emission-line galaxy surveys, when combined with ancillary photometric data, can be used to effectively trace the large-scale structure and protoclusters at a time when they are mostly dominated by star-forming galaxies.

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arXiv2020

Selection of massive evolved galaxies at $3 \leq z \leq 4.5$ in the CANDELS fields

Using the CANDELS photometric catalogs for the HST/ACS and WFC3, we identified massive evolved galaxies at $3 < z < 4.5$, employing three different selection methods. We find the comoving number density of these objects to be $\sim 2 \times 10^{-5}$ and $8 \times 10^{-6}Mpc^{-3}$ after correction for completeness for two redshift bins centered at $z=3.4, 4.7$. We quantify a measure of how much confidence we should have for each candidate galaxy from different selections and what are the conservative error estimates propagated into our selection. Then we compare the evolution of the corresponding number densities and their stellar mass density with numerical simulations, semi-analytical models, and previous observational estimates, which shows slight tension at higher redshifts as the models tend to underestimate the number and mass densities. By estimating the average halo masses of the candidates ($M_h \approx 4.2, 1.9, 1.3 \times 10^{12} M_\odot$ for redshift bins centered at $z=3.4, 4.1, 4.7$), we find them to be consistent with halos that were efficient in turning baryons to stars and were relatively immune to the feedback effects and on the verge of transition into hot-mode accretion. This can suggest the relative cosmological starvation of the cold gas followed by an overconsumption phase in which the galaxy consumes the available cold gas rapidly as one of the possible drivers for the quenching of the massive evolved population at high redshift.

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arXiv2020

Bridging between the integrated and resolved main sequence of star formation

The position of galaxies on the stellar mass, star formation rate plane with respect to the star-forming main sequence at each redshift is a convenient way to infer where the galaxy is in its evolution compared to the rest of the population. We use Hubble Space Telescope high resolution images in the GOODS-S field from the CANDELS survey and fit multi wavelength lights in resolution elements of galaxies with stellar population synthesis models. We then construct resolved kpc-scale stellar mass, star formation rate surface density curves for galaxies at z~1. Fitting these resolved main sequence curves with Schechter functions, we parameterize and explain the multi-wavelength structure of galaxies with three variables: phi*, alpha, and M*. For quenched galaxies below the main sequence, we find an average high mass slope (alpha) of the resolved main sequence curves to be ~ -0.4. The scatter of this slope is higher among the lower mass star forming galaxies and those above the main sequence compared to quenched galaxies, due to lack of an evolved bulge. Our findings agree well with an inside-out quenching of star-formation. We find that the knee of the Schechter fits (M*) for galaxies below the main sequence occurs at lower stellar mass surface densities compared to star forming galaxies, which hints at how far quenching has proceeded outwards.

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arXiv2019

Large Scale Structures in the CANDELS Fields: The Role of the Environment in Star Formation Activity

We present a robust method, weighted von Mises kernel density estimation, along with boundary correction to reconstruct the underlying number density field of galaxies. We apply this method to galaxies brighter than $\rm HST/F160w\le 26$ AB mag at the redshift range of $0.4\leq z \leq 5$ in the five CANDELS fields (GOODS-N, GOODS-S, EGS, UDS, and COSMOS). We then use these measurements to explore the environmental dependence of the star formation activity of galaxies. We find strong evidence of environmental quenching for massive galaxies ($\rm M \gtrsim 10^{11} \rm {M}_\odot$) out to $z\sim 3.5$ such that an over-dense environment hosts $\gtrsim 20\%$ more massive quiescent galaxies compared to an under-dense region. We also find that environmental quenching efficiency grows with stellar mass and reaches $\sim 60\%$ for massive galaxies at $z\sim 0.5$. The environmental quenching is also more efficient in comparison to the stellar mass quenching for low mass galaxies ($\rm M \lesssim 10^{10} \rm {M}_\odot$) at low and intermediate redshifts ($z\lesssim 1.2$). Our findings concur thoroughly with the "over-consumption" quenching model where the termination of cool gas accretion (cosmological starvation) happens in an over-dense environment and the galaxy starts to consume its remaining gas reservoir in depletion time. The depletion time depends on the stellar mass and could explain the evolution of environmental quenching efficiency with the stellar mass.

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