The early early type: discovery of a passive galaxy at z=3

We present the discovery of a massive, quiescent galaxy at z=2.99. We have obtained a HST/WFC3 spectrum of this object and measured its redshift from the detection of a deep 4000A break consistent with an old population and a high metallicity. By stellar population modeling of both its grism spectrum and broad-band photometry, we derive an age of ~0.7 Gyr, implying a formation redshift of z>4, and a mass >10^11 Msun. Although this passive galaxy is the most distant confirmed so far, we find that it is slightly less compact than other z>2 early-types of similar mass, being overall more analogous to those z~1.6 field early-type galaxies. The discovery of this object shows that early-type galaxies are detectable to at least z=3 and suggests that the diversity of structural properties found in z=1.4-2 ellipticals to earlier epochs could have its origin in a variety of formation histories among their progenitors.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letter

Formation Epochs, Star Formation Histories, and Sizes of Massive Early-Type Galaxies in Cluster and Field Environments at z = 1.2: Insights from the Rest-Frame Ultraviolet

International audienceWe derive stellar masses, ages, and star formation histories (SFHs) of massive early-type galaxies in the z = 1.237 RDCS1252.9-2927 cluster and compare them with those measured in a similarly mass-selected sample of field contemporaries drawn from the Great Observatories Origin Deep Survey South Field. Robust estimates of these parameters are obtained by comparing a large grid of composite stellar population models with 8-9 band photometry in the rest-frame near-ultraviolet, optical, and IR, thus sampling the entire relevant domain of emission of the different stellar populations. Additionally, we present new, deep U-band photometry of both fields, giving access to the critical far-ultraviolet rest frame, in order to empirically constrain the dependence of the most recent star formation processes on the environment. We also analyze the morphological properties of both samples to examine the dependence of their scaling relations on their mass and environment. We find that early-type galaxies, both in the cluster and in the field, show analogous optical morphologies, follow comparable mass versus size relation, have congruent average surface stellar mass densities, and lie on the same Kormendy relation. We also show that a fraction of early-type galaxies in the field employ longer timescales, tau, to assemble their mass than their cluster contemporaries. Hence, we conclude that while the formation epoch of early-type galaxies only depends on their mass, the environment does regulate the timescales of their SFHs. Our deep U-band imaging strongly supports this conclusion. We show that cluster galaxies are at least 0.5 mag fainter than their field contemporaries of similar mass and optical-to-infrared colors, implying that the last episode of star formation must have happened more recently in the field than in the cluster

The powerful lens galaxy cluster PLCK G287.0+32.9 (θE ∼ 43″)

We present a new high-precision strong-lensing model of PLCK G287.0+32.9, a massive lens galaxy cluster at z = 0:383, with the aim of obtaining an accurate estimation of its effective Einstein radius and total mass distribution.We also present a spectroscopic catalog containing accurate redshift measurements for close to 500 objects up to redshift z = 6, including multiply lensed sources and cluster member galaxies. Methods. We exploited high-quality spectroscopic data from the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE), covering a central 3 arcmin2 region of the cluster. We supplemented the spectroscopic catalog by including redshift measurements from VIsible MultiObject Spectrograph (VIMOS) and DEep Imaging Multi-Object Spectrograph (DEIMOS). We identified 129 spectroscopic cluster member galaxies with redshift values of 0:360 z 0:405, and mF160W 21. We complemented this galaxy cluster member sample with 24 photometric members identified with a convolutional neural network (CNN) approach.We also identified 114 multiple images from 28 background sources, of which 84 images from 16 sources are new and the remaining ones have already been identified in previous works. From these, we extracted 'golden sample' of 47 secure multiple images and used them, together with the selected cluster member, to build and optimize several strong-lensing models with the software lenstool. Results. The best-fitting lens model shows a root mean square (RMS) separation value between the predicted and observed positions of the multiple images of 0 0:0 75. Using its predictive power, we found three new multiple images and we confirm the configuration of three systems of multiple images that were not used for the optimization of the model. For a source at a redshift of zs = 2, we found a cluster with an Einstein radius of E = 43:400 0:100. This value is in agreement with previous estimates and corresponds to a total mass enclosed in the critical curve of ME = 3:33+0:02 0:07 1014 M. Conclusions. The combined application of ancillary Hubble Space Telescope (HST) imaging, VIMOS and DEIMOS data, and the new MUSE spectroscopic observations allowed us to build a new lens model of the galaxy cluster PLCK G287.0+32.9, with an improvement in terms of reconstructing the observed positions of the multiple images of a factor of 2:5 with respect to previous models. The derived total mass distribution confirms this cluster to be a very prominent gravitational lens, with an effective Einstein radius of E 4300. We were also able to construct an extensive spectroscopic catalog containing 490 objects, of which 153 are bright cluster members with mF160W 21, and 114 are multiple images.ISSN:0004-6361ISSN:1432-074

VLT and ACS Observations of RDCS J1252.9-2927: Dynamical Structure and Galaxy Populations in a Massive Cluster at z = 1.237

International audienceWe present results from an extensive spectroscopic survey, carried out with VLT FORS, and from an extensive multiwavelength imaging data set from the HST Advanced Camera for Surveys and ground-based facilities, of the cluster of galaxies RDCS J1252.9-2927. We have spectroscopically confirmed 38 cluster members in the redshift range 1.2

VLT and ACS Observations of RDCS J1252.9-2927: Dynamical Structure and Galaxy Populations in a Massive Cluster at z = 1.237

International audienceWe present results from an extensive spectroscopic survey, carried out with VLT FORS, and from an extensive multiwavelength imaging data set from the HST Advanced Camera for Surveys and ground-based facilities, of the cluster of galaxies RDCS J1252.9-2927. We have spectroscopically confirmed 38 cluster members in the redshift range 1.2