FRESCO: The Paschen-α star-forming sequence at cosmic noon

We present results from the JWST First Reionization Epoch Spectroscopically Complete Observations survey on the star-forming sequence (SFS) of galaxies at 1.0 < z < 1.7, around the peak of the cosmic star formation history. Star formation rates (SFRs) are measured from the redshifted, relatively dust-insensitive Paschen-α emission line, and stellar mass measurements include the F444W (4.4 μm; rest-frame H) band. We find SFRs of galaxies with log(M*/M⊙) > 9.5 that are lower than found in many earlier studies by up to 0.6 dex, but in good agreement with recent results obtained with the Prospector fitting framework. The difference (log(SFR(Paα)-SFR(Prospector)) is −0.09 ± 0.04 dex at 1010−11M⊙. We also measure the empirical relation between Paschen-α luminosity and rest-frame H-band magnitude and find that the scatter is only 0.04 dex lower than that of the SFR–M* relation and is much lower than the systematic differences among relations in the literature due to various methods of converting observed measurements to physical properties. We additionally identify examples of sources—that, with standard cutoffs via the UVJ diagram, would be deemed quiescent—with significant (log(sSFR)> −11 yr−1), typically extended, Paschen-α emission. Our results may be indicative of the potential unification of methods used to derive the SFS with careful selection of star-forming galaxies and independent SFR and stellar mass indicators.