Thesis

Beyond the limits: finding and studying the first galaxies with the largest surveys and their evolution

• Call:

  IDPASC Portugal - PHD Programme 2014

• Academic Year:

  2014 /2015

• Domain:

  Astrophysics

• Supervisor:

  David Sobral

• Co-Supervisor:

  José Afonso

• Institution:

  Faculdade de Ciências - Universidade de Lisboa

• Host Institution:

  Faculdade de Ciências - Universidade de Lisboa

• Abstract:

  This project aims at obtaining a completely self-consistent set of very large-area Lyman-alpha surveys in 9 different redshifts/cosmic time slices from z=2.23, (2.8 billion years after the Big Bang) to beyond the current record distance z=9 (~500 million years after the Big Bang), each populated by up to >1000s of Lyman-alpha emitters (for z<6). These surveys will be the largest, multi-cosmic epoch, narrow-band surveys, all undertaken in the same way (same reduction, selection). Because we already have pilot data (INT, CFHT, Subaru), the student's first results will be out way before e.g. Hyper Suprime-cam results. The samples (z=2.2, 2.4, 3.1, 4.3, 4.8, 5.7, 6.6, 7.1, 8.8) will include both AGN and star-forming galaxies, and also result in the largest samples of Lyman-alpha blobs (c.f. Matsuda et al. 2004) and of more typical LAEs. One of the main goals is to find and confirm the most distant luminous galaxies (z=7.1 and z=8.8 surveys, where the number of sources will be low). With very large samples, spanning a range of luminosities and physical properties, and over different large areas on the sky, we will conduct the best clustering measurements ever done (across cosmic time), and look for signatures of re-ionization, e.g. significant change in the clustering of Lyman-α emitters; this will be a major improvement over e.g. Ouchi et al. (2010). The high redshift Lyman-alpha surveys will be extremely large, >10,000 times larger than the typical ultra-deep fields, such as the HUDF with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope (e.g. Bouwens et al. 2011; Ellis et al. 2013), >20 times larger than e.g. Ouchi et al. (2008, 2010) and even larger (and significantly deeper) than e.g. Matthee, Sobral et al. (2014). The student will therefore derive by far the largest samples of the most distant galaxies and conduct detailed follow-up observations on the most luminous sources for the first time to unveil their nature and evolution (with e.g. MUSE/VLT).