A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys

Matthee JJ, Sobral D, Swinbank AM, Smail I, Best PN, Kim J-W, Franx M, Milvang-Jensen B, Fynbo J. 2014. A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 440(3), 2375–2387.

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Author
Matthee, Jorryt JISTA ; Sobral, David; Swinbank, A. M.; Smail, Ian; Best, P. N.; Kim, Jae-Woo; Franx, Marijn; Milvang-Jensen, Bo; Fynbo, Johan

Corresponding author has ISTA affiliation

Abstract
Candidate galaxies at redshifts of z ∼ 10 are now being found in extremely deep surveys, probing very small areas. As a consequence, candidates are very faint, making spectroscopic confirmation practically impossible. In order to overcome such limitations, we have undertaken the CF-HiZELS survey, which is a large-area, medium-depth near-infrared narrow-band survey targeted at z = 8.8 Lyman α (Lyα) emitters (LAEs) and covering 10 deg2 in part of the SSA22 field with the Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope (CFHT). We surveyed a comoving volume of 4.7 × 106 Mpc3 to a Lyα luminosity limit of 6.3 × 1043舁erg舁s−1. We look for Lyα candidates by applying the following criteria: (i) clear emission-line source, (ii) no optical detections (ugriz from CFHTLS), (iii) no visible detection in the optical stack (ugriz > 27), (iv) visually checked reliable NBJ and J detections and (v) J − K ≤ 0. We compute photometric redshifts and remove a significant amount of dusty lower redshift line-emitters at z ∼ 1.4 or 2.2. A total of 13 Lyα candidates were found, of which two are marked as strong candidates, but the majority have very weak constraints on their spectral energy distributions. Using follow-up observations with SINFONI/VLT, we are able to exclude the most robust candidates as LAEs. We put a strong constraint on the Lyα luminosity function at z ∼ 9 and make realistic predictions for ongoing and future surveys. Our results show that surveys for the highest redshift LAEs are susceptible of multiple contaminations and that spectroscopic follow-up is absolutely necessary.
Publishing Year
Date Published
2014-05-21
Journal Title
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Acknowledgement
We thank the anonymous referee for the comments and suggestions which improved both the quality and clarity of this work. DS acknowledges financial support from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) through a Veni fellowship. IRS acknowledges support from STFC (ST/I001573/1), a Leverhulme Fellowship, the ERC Advanced Investigator programme DUSTYGAL 321334 and a Royal Society/Wolfson Merit Award. PNB acknowledges support from the Leverhulme Trust. JWK acknowledges the support from the Creative Research Initiative Program, no. 2008- 0060544, of the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Korean government (MSIP). JPUF and BMJ acknowledge support from the ERC-StG grant EGGS-278202. The Dark Cosmology Centre is funded by the Danish National Research Foundation. This work is based in part on data obtained as part of the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey. Based on observations obtained with MegaPrime/MegaCam, a joint project of CFHT and CEA/IRFU, at the Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) which is operated by the National Research Council (NRC) of Canada, the Institut National des Science de l’Univers of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) of France and the University of Hawaii. This work is based in part on data products produced at Terapix available at the Canadian Astronomy Data Centre as part of the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Legacy Survey, a collaborative project of NRC and CNRS. This work was only possible due to OPTICON/FP7 and the access that it granted to the CFHT telescope. The authors also wish to acknowledge the CFHTLS and UKIDSS surveys for their excellent legacy and complementary value – without such high-quality data sets, this research would not have been possible.
Volume
440
Issue
3
Page
2375-2387
ISSN
eISSN
IST-REx-ID

Cite this

Matthee JJ, Sobral D, Swinbank AM, et al. A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 2014;440(3):2375-2387. doi:10.1093/mnras/stu392
Matthee, J. J., Sobral, D., Swinbank, A. M., Smail, I., Best, P. N., Kim, J.-W., … Fynbo, J. (2014). A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stu392
Matthee, Jorryt J, David Sobral, A. M. Swinbank, Ian Smail, P. N. Best, Jae-Woo Kim, Marijn Franx, Bo Milvang-Jensen, and Johan Fynbo. “A 10 Deg2 Lyman α Survey at Z=8.8 with Spectroscopic Follow-up: Strong Constraints on the Luminosity Function and Implications for Other Surveys.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Oxford University Press, 2014. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stu392.
J. J. Matthee et al., “A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, vol. 440, no. 3. Oxford University Press, pp. 2375–2387, 2014.
Matthee JJ, Sobral D, Swinbank AM, Smail I, Best PN, Kim J-W, Franx M, Milvang-Jensen B, Fynbo J. 2014. A 10 deg2 Lyman α survey at z=8.8 with spectroscopic follow-up: Strong constraints on the luminosity function and implications for other surveys. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 440(3), 2375–2387.
Matthee, Jorryt J., et al. “A 10 Deg2 Lyman α Survey at Z=8.8 with Spectroscopic Follow-up: Strong Constraints on the Luminosity Function and Implications for Other Surveys.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, vol. 440, no. 3, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 2375–87, doi:10.1093/mnras/stu392.
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