Dead or Alive? How Bursty Star Formation and Patchy Dust Can Cause Temporary Quiescence in High-redshift Galaxies

Autor: Andreas L. Faisst, Takahiro Morishita
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2024
Předmět:
Zdroj: The Astrophysical Journal, Vol 971, Iss 1, p 47 (2024)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 1538-4357
DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ad58e2
Popis: The recent discovery of a galaxy at z = 7.3 with undetected optical emission lines and a blue UV-to-optical continuum ratio in JWST spectroscopy is surprising and needs to be explained physically. Here, we explore two possibilities that could cause such a seemingly quiescent ∼5 × 10 ^8 M _⊙ galaxy in the early Universe: (i) stochastic variations in the star formation history (SFH) and (ii) the effect of spatially varying dust attenuation on the measured line and continuum emission properties. Both scenarios can play out at the same time to amplify the effect. A stochastic star formation model (similar to realistic SFHs from hydrodynamical simulations of similar-mass galaxies) can create such observed properties if star formation is fast-varying with a correlation time of
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals