[C ii] 158-μm emission from the host galaxies of damped Lyman-alpha systems

Marcel Neeleman; Nissim Kanekar; J Xavier Prochaska; Marc Rafelski; Chris L Carilli; Arthur M Wolfe

doi:10.1126/science.aal1737

[C ii] 158-μm emission from the host galaxies of damped Lyman-alpha systems

Science. 2017 Mar 24;355(6331):1285-1288. doi: 10.1126/science.aal1737.

Authors

Marcel Neeleman¹, Nissim Kanekar², J Xavier Prochaska³, Marc Rafelski⁴, Chris L Carilli^{5

6}, Arthur M Wolfe⁷

Affiliations

¹ University of California Observatories-Lick Observatory, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA. marcel@ucsc.edu.
² National Centre for Radio Astrophysics, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Pune University, Pune 411007, India.
³ University of California Observatories-Lick Observatory, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA.
⁴ Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA.
⁵ National Radio Astronomy Observatory, Socorro, NM 87801, USA.
⁶ Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, 19 J. J. Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE, UK.
⁷ Department of Physics and Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, University of California, San Diego, CA 92063, USA.

PMID: 28336663
DOI: 10.1126/science.aal1737

Abstract

Gas surrounding high-redshift galaxies has been studied through observations of absorption line systems toward background quasars for decades. However, it has proven difficult to identify and characterize the galaxies associated with these absorbers due to the intrinsic faintness of the galaxies compared with the quasars at optical wavelengths. Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array, we report on detections of [C ii] 158-μm line and dust-continuum emission from two galaxies associated with two such absorbers at a redshift of z ~ 4. Our results indicate that the hosts of these high-metallicity absorbers have physical properties similar to massive star-forming galaxies and are embedded in enriched neutral hydrogen gas reservoirs that extend well beyond the star-forming interstellar medium of these galaxies.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't