A possible signature of primordial stellar populations in z=3z=3 Lyman α\alpha emitters

Observations with Subaru telescope have detected surprisingly strong Lyman continuum (LyC; $\sim900$ \AA\ in the rest-frame) from some Lyman $\alpha$ emitters (LAEs) at $z=3.1$. We have examined the stellar population which simultaneously accounts for the strength of the LyC and the spectral slope of non-ionizing ultraviolet of the LAEs. As a result, we have found that stellar populations with metallicity $Z\geq1/50 Z_\odot$ can explain the observed LyC strength only with a very top-heavy initial mass function (IMF; $\sim 50 M_\odot$). However, the critical metallicity for such an IMF is expected to be much lower. A very young ($\sim1$ Myr) and massive ($\sim100$ $M_\odot$) extremely metal-poor ($Z\leq5\times10^{-4}Z_\odot$) or metal-free (so-called Population III) stellar population can also reproduce the observed LyC strength if the mass fraction of such 'primordial' stellar population is $\sim1$% in total stellar mass of the LAEs.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, First Stars IV in Kyoto conference (May 2012) proceedin

Evolution of Dust-to-Metal Ratio in Galaxies

This paper investigates the evolution of the dust-to-metal ratio in galaxies based on a simple evolution model for the amount of metal and dust with infall. We take into account grain formation in stellar mass-loss gas, grain growth by the accretion of metallic atoms in a cold dense cloud, and grain destruction by SNe shocks. Especially, we propose that the accretion efficiency is independent of the star-formation history. This predicts various evolutionary tracks in the metallicity ($Z$)--dust-to-gas ratio ($\cal D$) plane depending on the star-formation history. In this framework, the observed linear $Z$--$\cal D$ relation of nearby spiral galaxies can be interpreted as a sequence of a constant galactic age. We emphasize that an observational study of the $Z$--$\cal D$ relation of galaxies at $z\sim 1$ is very useful to constrain the efficiencies of dust growth and destruction. We also suggest that the Lyman break galaxies at $z\sim 3$ have a very low dust-to-metal ratio, typically \ltsim 0.1. Although the effect of infall on the evolutionary tracks in the $Z$--$\cal D$ plane is quite small, the dispersion of the infall rate can disturb the $Z$--$\cal D$ relation with a constant galactic age.Comment: 9 pages, accepted to appear in PASJ October issu

Constraint on intergalactic dust from thermal history of intergalactic medium

This Letter investigates the amount of dust in the intergalactic medium (IGM). The dust photoelectric heating can be the most efficient heating mechanism in the IGM where the density is very small and there are a lot of hard ultraviolet photons. Comparing the observational thermal history of IGM with a theoretical one taking into account the dust photoelectric heating, we can put an upper limit on the dust-to-gas ratio, ${\cal D}$, in the IGM. Since the rate of the dust photoelectric heating depends on the size of dust, we find the following results: If the grain size is \ga 100 \AA, ${\cal D}$ at $z \sim 3$ is \la 1/100 Galactic value corresponding to \Omega_{\rm dust}^{\rm IGM}\la 10^{-5}. On the other hand, if the grain size is as small as $\sim 10$ \AA, ${\cal D}$ is \la 1/1000 Galactic value corresponding to \Omega_{\rm dust}^{\rm IGM}\la 10^{-6}.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures; accepted for publication in MNRAS pink page

The critical radiation intensity for direct collapse black hole formation: dependence on the radiation spectral shape

It has been proposed that supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are originated from direct-collapse black holes (DCBHs) that are formed at z gtrsim 10 in the primordial gas in the case that H2 cooling is suppressed by strong external radiation. In this work, we study the critical specific intensity J^crit required for DCBH formation for various radiation spectral shapes by a series of one-zone calculations of a collapsing primordial- gas cloud. We calculate the critical specific intensity at the Lyman-Werner (LW) bands J^crit_LW,21 (in units of 10^-21 erg s^-1 Hz^-1 sr^-1 cm^-2) for realistic spectra of metal-poor galaxies. We find J^crit is not sensitive to the age or metallicity for the constant star formation galaxies with J^crit_LW,21 = 1300-1400, while J^crit decreases as galaxies become older or more metal-enriched for the instantaneous starburst galaxies. However, such dependence for the instantaneous starburst galaxies is weak for the young or extremely metal-poor galaxies: J^crit_LW,21 = 1000-1400 for the young galaxies and J^crit_LW,21 approx 1400 for the extremely metal-poor galaxies. The typical value of J^crit for the realistic spectra is higher than those expected in the literature, which affects the estimated DCBH number density n_DCBH. By extrapolating the result of Dijkstra, Ferrara and Mesinger, we obtain n_DCBH sim 10^-10 cMpc^-3 at z = 10, although there is still large uncertainty in this estimation.Comment: 11 pages, 6 figures, submitted to MNRA

Physical Properties of UDF12 Galaxies in Cosmological simulations

We have performed a large cosmological hydrodynamics simulation tailored to the deep survey with the Hubble Space Telescope made in 2012, the so-called UDF12 campaign. After making a light-cone output, we have applied the same color selection criteria as the UDF12 campaign to select galaxies from our simulation, and then, have examined the physical properties of them as a proxy of the real observed UDF12 galaxies at $z > 7$. As a result, we find that the halo mass is almost linearly proportional to the observed ultraviolet (UV) luminosity ($4 \times 10^{11}~{\rm M_{\odot}}$ at $M_{\rm UV} = -21$). The dust attenuation and UV slope $\beta$ well correlates with the observed UV luminosity, which is consistent with observations quantitatively. The star formation rate (SFR) is also linearly proportional to the stellar mass and the specific SFR shows only a weak dependency on the mass. We also find an increasing star formation history with a time-scale of $\sim100$ Myr in the high-$z$ galaxies. An average metallicity weighted by the Lyman continuum luminosity reaches up to $>0.1$ Solar even at $z \sim 10$, suggesting a rapid metal enrichment. We also expect $\geq 0.1$ mJy at 350 GHz of the dust thermal emission from the galaxies with $H_{160} \leq 27$, which can be detectable with the Atacama Large Milimetre-submilimetre Array. The galaxies selected by the UDF12 survey contribute to only $52--12\%$ of the cosmic SFR density from $z \sim 7$ to $z \sim 10$, respectively. The James Webb Space Telescope will push the detection fraction up to $77--72\%$.Comment: re-Submitted to MNRAS; 16 pages; 14 figures; 1 tables