1,568 research outputs found
Stellar Feedback in Molecular Clouds and its Influence on the Mass Function of Young Star Clusters
We investigate how the removal of interstellar material by stellar feedback
limits the efficiency of star formation in molecular clouds and how this
determines the shape of the mass function of young star clusters. In
particular, we derive relations between the power-law exponents of the mass
functions of the clouds and clusters in the limiting regimes in which the
feedback is energy-driven and momentum-driven, corresponding to minimum and
maximum radiative losses and likely to bracket all realistic cases. We find
good agreement between the predicted and observed exponents, especially for
momentum-driven feedback, provided the protoclusters have roughly constant mean
surface density, as indicated by observations of the star-forming clumps within
molecular clouds. We also consider a variety of specific feedback mechanisms,
concluding that HII regions inflated by radiation pressure predominate in
massive protoclusters, a momentum-limited process when photons can escape after
only a few interactions with dust grains. We then present a first estimate of
the star formation efficiency in this case, finding that it depends on the
masses and sizes of the protoclusters only through their mean surface density,
thus ensuring consistency between the observed power-law exponents of the mass
functions of the clouds and clusters. The numerical value of this efficiency is
also consistent with observations.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, emulateapj format, version accepted to ApJ
Shadow of a Colossus: A z=2.45 Galaxy Protocluster Detected in 3D Ly-a Forest Tomographic Mapping of the COSMOS Field
Using moderate-resolution optical spectra from 58 background Lyman-break
galaxies and quasars at within a area of the
COSMOS field ( projected area density or mean transverse separation), we reconstruct a 3D
tomographic map of the foreground Ly forest absorption at
with an effective smoothing scale of
comoving. Comparing with 61
coeval galaxies with spectroscopic redshifts in the same volume, we find that
the galaxy positions are clearly biased towards regions with enhanced IGM
absorption in the tomographic map. We find an extended IGM overdensity with
deep absorption troughs at associated with a recently-discovered
galaxy protocluster at the same redshift. Based on simulations matched to our
data, we estimate the enclosed dark matter mass within this IGM overdensity to
be , and
argue based on this mass and absorption strength that it will form at least one
galaxy cluster with , although its elongated nature suggests that
it will likely collapse into two separate clusters. We also point out a compact
overdensity of six MOSDEF galaxies at within a radius and , which does not appear
to have a large associated IGM overdensity. These results demonstrate the
potential of Ly forest tomography on larger volumes to study galaxy
properties as a function of environment, as well as revealing the large-scale
IGM overdensities associated with protoclusters and other features of
large-scale structure.Comment: To be submitted to ApJ. Figure 3 can be viewed on Youtube:
https://youtu.be/KeW1UJOPMY
A Systematic Survey of Protoclusters at in the CFHTLS Deep Fields
We present the discovery of three protoclusters at with
spectroscopic confirmation in the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) Legacy
Survey Deep Fields. In these fields, we investigate the large-scale projected
sky distribution of Lyman break galaxies and identify 21
protocluster candidates from regions that are overdense at more than
overdensity significance. Based on cosmological simulations, it is expected
that more than of these candidates will evolve into a galaxy cluster of
at least a halo mass of at . We perform
follow-up spectroscopy for eight of the candidates using Subaru/FOCAS,
KeckII/DEIMOS, and Gemini-N/GMOS. In total we target 462 dropout candidates and
obtain 138 spectroscopic redshifts. We confirm three real protoclusters at
with more than five members spectroscopically identified, and
find one to be an incidental overdense region by mere chance alignment. The
other four candidate regions at require more spectroscopic
follow-up in order to be conclusive. A protocluster, which has eleven
spectroscopically confirmed members, shows a remarkable core-like structure
composed of a central small region (Mpc}) and an
outskirts region (). The Ly equivalent
widths of members of the protocluster are significantly smaller than those of
field galaxies at the same redshift while there is no difference in the UV
luminosity distributions. These results imply that some environmental effects
start operating as early as at along with the growth of the
protocluster structure.Comment: 25 pages, 6 tables, 25 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
Protocluster Discovery in Tomographic Ly Forest Flux Maps
We present a new method of finding protoclusters using tomographic maps of
Ly Forest flux. We review our method of creating tomographic flux maps
and discuss our new high performance implementation, which makes large
reconstructions computationally feasible. Using a large N-body simulation, we
illustrate how protoclusters create large-scale flux decrements, roughly 10
Mpc across, and how we can use this signal to find them in flux maps.
We test the performance of our protocluster finding method by running it on the
ideal, noiseless map and tomographic reconstructions from mock surveys, and
comparing to the halo catalog. Using the noiseless map, we find protocluster
candidates with about 90% purity, and recover about 75% of the protoclusters
that form massive clusters (). We
construct mock surveys similar to the ongoing COSMOS Lyman-Alpha Mapping And
Tomography Observations (CLAMATO) survey. While the existing data has an
average sightline separation of 2.3 Mpc, we test separations of 2 - 6
Mpc to see what can be tolerated for our application. Using
reconstructed maps from small separation mock surveys, the protocluster
candidate purity and completeness are very close what was found in the
noiseless case. As the sightline separation increases, the purity and
completeness decrease, although they remain much higher than we initially
expected. We extended our test cases to mock surveys with an average separation
of 15 Mpc, meant to reproduce high source density areas of the BOSS
survey. We find that even with such a large sightline separation, the method
can still be used to find some of the largest protoclusters.Comment: 18 pages, 12 figure
Understanding large-scale structure in the SSA22 protocluster region using cosmological simulations
We investigate the nature and evolution of large-scale structure within the
SSA22 protocluster region at using cosmological simulations. A
redshift histogram constructed from current spectroscopic observations of the
SSA22 protocluster reveals two separate peaks at (blue) and (red). Based on these data, we report updated overdensity and mass
calculations for the SSA22 protocluster. We find ,
for the blue and red peaks, respectively, and
for the entire region. These overdensities
correspond to masses of , , and
for the red, blue, and
total peaks, respectively. We use the Small MultiDark Planck (SMDPL) simulation
to identify comparably massive protoclusters, and uncover the
underlying structure and ultimate fate of the SSA22 protocluster. For this
analysis, we construct mock redshift histograms for each simulated
protocluster, quantitatively comparing them with the observed SSA22 data. We
find that the observed double-peaked structure in the SSA22 redshift histogram
corresponds not to a single coalescing cluster, but rather the proximity of a
protocluster and at least one cluster progenitor. Such associations in the SMDPL simulation are
easily understood within the framework of hierarchical clustering of dark
matter halos. We finally find that the opportunity to observe such a phenomenon
is incredibly rare, with an occurrence rate of 7.4h^3 \mbox{ Gpc}^{-3}.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures, Accepted to Ap
Protoclusters associated with z > 2 radio galaxies. I. Characteristics of high redshift protoclusters
[Abridged] We present the results of a large program conducted with the Very
Large Telescope and Keck telescope to search for forming clusters of galaxies
near powerful radio galaxies at 2.0 < z < 5.2. We obtained narrow- and
broad-band images of nine radio galaxies and their surroundings. The imaging
was used to select candidate Lyman alpha emitting galaxies in ~3x3 Mpc^2 areas
near the radio galaxies. A total of 337 candidate emitters were found with a
rest-frame Lyman alpha equivalent width of EW_0 > 15 A and Sigma = EW_0/Delta
EW_0 > 3. Follow-up spectroscopy confirmed 168 Lyman alpha emitters near eight
radio galaxies. The success rate of our selection procedure is 91%. At least
six of our eight fields are overdense in Lyman alpha emitters by a factor 3-5.
Also, the emitters show significant clustering in velocity space. In the
overdense fields, the width of the velocity distributions of the emitters is a
factor 2-5 smaller than the width of the narrow-band filters. Taken together,
we conclude that we have discovered six forming clusters of galaxies
(protoclusters). We estimate that roughly 75% of powerful (L_2.7GHz > 10^33
erg/s/Hz/sr) high redshift radio galaxies reside in a protocluster, with a
sizes of at least 1.75 Mpc. We estimate that the protoclusters have masses in
the range 2-9 x 10^14 Msun and they are likely to be progenitors of present-day
(massive) clusters of galaxies. For the first time, we have been able to
estimate the velocity dispersion of cluster progenitors from z~5 to ~2. The
velocity dispersion of the emitters increases with cosmic time, in agreement
with the dark matter velocity dispersion in numerical simulations of forming
massive clusters.Comment: 30 pages, 20 figures. Published in A&A. The article with high
resolution figures is available at
http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~venemans/research/datapaper/index.htm
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