ABSTRACT
We present a statistical study of velocities of Lyα, interstellar (IS) absorption, and nebular lines and gas covering fraction for Lyα emitters (LAEs) at z
2. We make a sample of 22 LAEs with a large Lyα equivalent width (EW) of
50 Å based on our deep Keck/Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS) observations, in conjunction with spectroscopic data from the Subaru/Fiber Multi Object Spectrograph program and the literature. We estimate the average velocity offset of Lyα from a systemic redshift determined with nebular lines to be ΔvLyα = 234 ± 9 km s−1. Using a Kolmogorov–Smirnov test, we confirm the previous claim of Hashimoto et al. that the average ΔvLyα of LAEs is smaller than that of Lyman break galaxies (LBGs). Our LRIS data successfully identify blueshifted multiple IS absorption lines in the UV continua of four LAEs on an individual basis. The average velocity offset of IS absorption lines from a systemic redshift is ΔvIS = 204 ± 27 km s−1, indicating LAEs' gas outflow with a velocity comparable to typical LBGs. Thus, the ratio
of LAEs is around unity, suggestive of low impacts on Lyα transmission by resonant scattering of neutral hydrogen in the IS medium. We find an anti-correlation between Lyα EW and the covering fraction, fc, estimated from the depth of absorption lines, where fc is an indicator of average neutral hydrogen column density, NH i. The results of our study support the idea that NH i is a key quantity determining Lyα emissivity.
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1. INTRODUCTION
Lyα emitters (LAEs) are an important population of high-z star-forming galaxies in the context of galaxy formation. LAEs at z = 2–7 and beyond z = 7 are found by narrowband (NB) imaging observations based on an NB excess resulting from their prominent Lyα emission (e.g., Cowie et al. 2010; Gronwall et al. 2007; Ciardullo et al. 2012; Ouchi et al. 2008; Ota et al. 2008; Ouchi et al. 2010; Hu et al. 2010; Finkelstein et al. 2007; Kashikawa et al. 2011, 2006; Shibuya et al. 2012). Observational studies on a morphology and spectral energy distribution (SED) of LAEs reveal that such a galaxy is typically young, compact, less massive, less dusty than other high-z galaxy populations, and is a possible progenitor of Milky Way mass galaxies (e.g., Gronwall et al. 2011; Guaita et al. 2011; Ono et al. 2010; Gawiser et al. 2007; Dressler et al. 2011; Rauch et al. 2008; Dijkstra & Kramer 2012). Additionally, LAEs are used to measure the neutral hydrogen fraction at the reionizing epoch, because Lyα photons are absorbed by intergalactic medium (IGM).
The Lyα-emitting mechanism is not fully understood due to the highly complex radiative transfer of Lyα in the interstellar medium (ISM). Many theoretical models have predicted that the neutral gas and/or dust distributions surrounding central ionizing sources are closely linked to the Lyα emissivity (e.g., Neufeld 1991; Finkelstein et al. 2008; Laursen et al. 2013, 2009; Laursen & Sommer-Larsen 2007; Duval et al. 2014; Zheng & Wallace 2013; Zheng et al. 2010; Yajima et al. 2012). Thus, resonant scattering in the neutral ISM can significantly attenuate the Lyα emission.
Lyα emissivity may not only depend on the spatial ISM distribution, but on gas kinematics as well. The large-scale galactic outflows driven by starbursts or active galactic nuclei could allow Lyα photons to emerge at wavelengths where the Gunn–Peterson opacity is reduced, and consequently enhance the Lyα emissivity, particularly in the high-z universe (e.g., Dijkstra & Wyithe 2010). The outflow may also blow out the Lyα absorbing ISM. The gas kinematics of LAEs has been evaluated from the Lyα velocity offset (ΔvLyα) with respect to the systemic redshift (zsys) traced by nebular emission lines (e.g., Hα, [O iii]) from their H ii regions. Over the past few years, deep near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopic studies have detected nebular emission lines from ~10 LAEs at z = 2–3, and measured their ΔvLyα (McLinden et al. 2011; Hashimoto et al. 2013; Guaita et al. 2013; Finkelstein et al. 2011; Chonis et al. 2013). The Lyα emission lines for these LAEs are redshifted from their zsys by a ΔvLyα of 200–300 km s−1. Hashimoto et al. (2013) find an anti-correlation between Lyα equivalent width (EW) and ΔvLyα in a compilation of LAE and Lyman break galaxy (LBG) samples. This result is in contrast to a simple picture where Lyα photons more easily escape in the presence of a galactic outflow.
However, the Lyα velocity offset is thought to increase with both resonant scattering in H i gas clouds as well as galactic outflow velocity (e.g., Verhamme et al. 2006, 2008). The anti-correlation could result from a difference in H i column density (NH i) rather than outflowing velocity. The gas kinematics can be investigated more directly from the velocity offset between interstellar (IS) absorption lines of the rest-frame UV continuum and zsys (IS velocity offset; ΔvIS). The IS velocity offset traces the speed of outflowing gas clouds, and may help to distinguish the two effects on ΔvLyα.
For UV-continuum-selected galaxies, the ΔvIS has been measured for >100 objects (e.g., Pettini et al. 2001; Christensen et al. 2012; Kulas et al. 2012; Schenker et al. 2013; Steidel et al. 2010). Steidel et al. (2010) find that LBGs have an average of 〈ΔvIS〉 = −164 km s−1 in their sample of 89 LBGs at z ~ 3. This statistical study indicates the ubiquitousness of galactic outflow in LBGs. However, there have been no NB-selected galaxies with a ΔvIS measurement to date except for a stacked UV spectrum in Hashimoto et al. (2013). This is because it is difficult to estimate ΔvIS for individual LAEs, especially for galaxies with a large Lyα EW of
50 Å due to their faint UV-continuum emission, while ΔvIS are measured for some UV-selected galaxies with EW(Lyα) ~ 50 Å (e.g., Erb et al. 2010). A statistical investigation of Lyα kinematics for LAEs could shed light on the physical origin of the anti-correlation and the underlying Lyα emitting mechanism.
This is the second paper in the series exploring the Lyα-emitting mechanisms.8 In this paper, we present the results of our optical and NIR spectroscopy for a large sample of z = 2.2 LAEs with Keck/Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS) and Subaru/Fiber Multi Object Spectrograph (FMOS) to verify possible differences of ΔvLyα and ΔvIS between LAEs and LBGs. These spectroscopic observations are in an extension of the project of Hashimoto et al. (2013) aiming to confirm the anti-correlation between Lyα EW and ΔvLyα. The organization of this paper is as follows. In Section 2, we describe the details of the LAEs targeted for our spectroscopy. Next, we show our optical and NIR spectroscopic observations in Section 3. We present methods to reduce the spectra, and to measure kinematic quantities such as ΔvLyα and ΔvIS in Section 4. We perform SED fitting to derive physical properties in Section 5. We compare kinematic properties between LAEs and LBGs in Section 6, and discuss physical origins of possible differences in these quantities in Section 7. In the last section, Section 8, we summarize our findings.
Throughout this paper, we adopt the concordance cosmology with
(Komatsu et al. 2011). All magnitudes are given in the AB system (Oke & Gunn 1983).
2. TARGETS FOR SPECTROSCOPY
Our targets for optical and NIR spectroscopy are z = 2.2 LAEs selected by observations of the Subaru/Suprime-Cam (Miyazaki et al. 2002) equipped with the NB filter, NB387 (λc = 3870 Å and FWHM =94 Å; Nakajima et al. 2012, 2013). The details of observations and selection for LAEs are given in these papers, but we provide a brief description as follows. The Suprime-Cam observations have been carried out for LAEs at z = 2.2 with NB387 in a total area of ~1.5 deg2. Based on the color selection of B − NB387 and u* − NB387, the Suprime-Cam observations have located 619, 919, 747, 950, and 168 LAEs in the Cosmic Evolution Survey (COSMOS; Scoville et al. 2007), the Subaru/XMM-Newton Deep Survey (SXDS; Furusawa et al. 2008), the Chandra Deep Field South (CDFS; Giacconi et al. 2001), the Hubble Deep Field North (HDFN; Giavalisco et al. 2004), and the SSA22 (e.g., Steidel et al. 2000) fields, respectively. In the above five fields, a total of ~3400 LAEs have been selected down to a Lyα EW of 20–30 Å in rest-frame (K. Nakajima et al. in preparation). This large sample size enables us to study statistically various properties of high-z LAEs, such as structural properties (Shibuya et al. 2014) and the statistics of Lyα halos (Momose et al. 2014).
3. OBSERVATION
3.1. Optical Spectroscopy for Lyα and UV Continuum Emission
We have carried out optical spectroscopy for our z = 2.2 LAE sample with the LRIS (Oke et al. 1995; Steidel et al. 2004) on the Keck I telescope in order to detect their redshifted Lyα emission lines. We used six multi-object slit (MOS) masks for LAEs selected in the NB387 imaging observations in the COSMOS, HDFN, HUDF, SSA22, and SXDS fields. The mask for the objects in the HUDF includes two LAEs whose nebular emission lines were detected in the 3D-HST survey (H. Atek et al. in preparation). The total number of LAEs observed with these LRIS masks is 83. The observations were conducted on 2012 March 19–21 and November 14–15 (UST) with seeing sizes of 0
7–1
6. Spectrophotometric standard stars were observed on each night for flux calibrations. The spectral resolution is R ~ 1000. The number of observed LAEs, grisms, central wavelengths, and observing time in each slit-masks are summarized in Table 1.
Table 1. Summary of the Keck/LRIS Observations
| Slit Mask | nLAE/nobj | Grating/λc | t1 | nframe | Texp | Date of Observations |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (s) | (s) | ||||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) |
| COSMOS | 14/16 | 600/4000 | 3000 | 8 | 24000 | 2012 Mar 19–21 |
| HDFN1 | 18/22 | 600/4000 | 3000 | 6 | 18000 | 2012 Mar 20 |
| HDFN2 | 18/20 | 1200/3400 | 2800–3000 | 6 | 17800 | 2012 Mar 19–20 |
| COSMOS3B | 16/22 | 600/4000 | 3000 | 3 | 9000 | 2012 Nov 15 |
| HUDF_maB | 9/31 | 400/3400 | 2758–3000 | 2 | 5758 | 2012 Nov 14 |
| SXDS495B | 8/30 | 600/4000 | 2136–3000 | 14 | 40854 | 2012 Nov 14–15 |
Notes. Columns: (1) Slit mask. (2) Number of objects included in the slit mask. (3). Grating and the central wavelength. (4) Exposure time of one frame. (5) Number of exposure. (6) Exposure time. (7) Date of observations.
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3.2. Near-infrared Spectroscopy for Nebular Emission
To calculate systemic redshifts of our LAEs from their nebular emission lines, we use NIR spectroscopic data obtained from observations with the FMOS (Kimura et al. 2010) on the Subaru telescope on 2012 December 22, 23, and 24 (UST). All LAEs in the SXDS and COSMOS fields are observed with the J- and H-band filters of FMOS. Details of the FMOS observation and reduction are shown in K. Nakajima et al. (in preparation). The systemic redshifts for objects were derived by simultaneously fitting to Hβ and [O iii] λ4958, 5007 emission lines by using their vacuum wavelengths in rest frame.
4. SPECTROSCOPIC DATA
4.1. Reduction of LRIS Spectra
Our LRIS spectra in each MOS mask are reduced with the public Low-Redux (XIDL) pipeline,9 for long-slit and multi-slit data from the spectrographs on the Keck, Gemini, MMT, and Lick telescopes. We reduce the spectra of LAEs with this software in the following manner. First, we create flats, calibrate wavelengths with the arc data, and reject sources illuminated by the cosmic ray injections for two-dimensional (2D) spectra in the MOS masks. Next, we automatically identify emission lines and continua, and trace them in each slit in individual one-frame masks. After the source identification, we subtract the sky background, and correct for the distortion of the 2D MOS mask images using sky lines. According to the information on the source identifications, we extract one-dimensional (1D) spectra from each slit in individual mask images. Finally, we stack the extracted 1D spectra.
The public XIDL software extracts 1D spectra from each one-exposure frame before combining these 2D mask images. This process makes it difficult to detect faint emission lines and continua that are undetectable in individual one-exposure images. Then, we additionally search for faint emission lines from stacked 2D images by visual inspection after combining one-exposure frames.
In total, the Lyα emission lines are detected from 26 objects in the LRIS spectroscopy. Figure 1 shows the spectroscopic success rate in the detection of Lyα emission. The success rate is ~70% for bright objects with NB387
24.5. However, low detection and/or selection completeness at NB387
24.5 reduces largely the success rate (~20%). The photometric and spectroscopic properties of these Lyα-detected objects are listed in Table 2. Among these LRIS spectra, we identify eight LAEs with detections of Lyα and nebular emission lines excluding active galactic nucleus (AGN) like objects.
Figure 1. Success rate in identifying a Lyα emission line in the LRIS spectroscopy as a function of NB387 magnitude. The gray histogram shows the number of targeted LAEs. The black histogram indicate the number of LAEs with a Lyα detection. The histogram of targeted LAEs is slightly shifted for clarity.
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 2. Summary of the Lyα-detected Objects in the LRIS Spectroscopy
| Slit Mask | Object | R.A. | Decl. | U | NB387 | B | λobs | zLyα | f(Lyα) | L(Lyα) | EW(Lyα) | zsys | ΔvLyα | Fblue/Ftot |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (10−17erg s−1 cm−2) | (1042erg s−1) | (Å) | (km s−1) | ||||||||||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) | (8) | (9) | (10) | (11) | (12) | (13) | (14) | (15) |
| COSMOS | 12027 | 149.9343976 | +2.1285326 | 24.2 | 23.4 | 24.5 | 3878.72 ± 0.24 | 2.1906 | 5.6 ± 0.3 | 2.0 ± 0.1 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ |
| 12805a | 150.0637013 | +2.1354116 | 23.7 | 23.3 | 23.8 | 3843.27 ± 0.65 | 2.16144 | 7.4 ± 0.7 | 2.6 ± 0.3 | ![]() |
2.15872 | 258 ± 51 | 0.24 | |
| 13138 | 150.0108585 | +2.1401388 | 24.9 | 24.6 | 25.0 | 3866.73 ± 0.89 | 2.18074 | 1.2 ± 0.2 | 0.43 ± 0.07 | ![]() |
2.17921 | 144 ± 69 | 0.40 | |
| 13636a,b | 149.9974498 | +2.1439906 | 23.9 | 23.0 | 24.1 | 3844.68 ± 1.30 | 2.1626 | 9.6 ± 0.5 | 3.3 ± 0.2 | ![]() |
2.16052 | 197 ± 102c | 0.13 | |
| 14212a | 149.9585714 | +2.1482830 | 24.0 | 23.3 | 24.0 | 3879.99 ± 0.52 | 2.19165 | 6.7 ± 0.6 | 2.4 ± 0.2 | ![]() |
2.18955 | 188 ± 40 | 0.23 | |
| 08357d | 149.9961405 | +2.0921070 | 24.8 | 24.4 | 24.9 | 3868.79 ± 0.86 | 2.18243 | 1.4 ± 0.4 | 0.50 ± 0.14 | ![]() |
2.18044 | 205 ± 66 | 0.13 | |
| 13820d | 149.9554179 | +2.1470628 | 25.6 | 25.1 | 25.9 | 3820.20 ± 1.01 | 2.14246 | 2.1 ± 0.2 | 0.72 ± 0.07 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 14135d | 149.9770609 | +2.1508410 | 27.0 | 25.9 | 26.8 | 3893.06 ± 1.08 | 2.2024 | 0.62 ± 0.1 | 2.3 ± 0.4 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ||
| HDFN1 | 18325e | 189.0973399 | +62.1014179 | 22.9 | 21.6 | 23.2 | 3858.78 ± 0.25 | 2.1742 | 30.0 ± 0.9 | 10.6 ± 0.3 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ |
| 20042d | 189.0293966 | +62.1176510 | 25.4 | 24.7 | 25.6 | 3864.87 ± 2.12 | 2.17921 | 1.5 ± 0.4 | 0.53 ± 0.14 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| HDFN2 | 31902 | 189.3127706 | +62.2091548 | 25.4 | 23.9 | 24.9 | 3865.31 ± 0.31 | 2.17957 | 1.6 ± 0.2 | 0.6 ± 0.08 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ |
| 43408 | 189.4532215 | +62.2639356 | 26.7 | 25.4 | 26.3 | 3886.59 ± 0.47 | 2.19708 | 5.6 ± 0.2 | 2.0 ± 0.1 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 42659d | 189.4575590 | +62.2917868 | 25.9 | 23.8 | 25.9 | 3882.07 ± 0.61 | 2.19336 | 1.4 ± 0.1 | 0.51 ± 0.04 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| COSMOS3B | 38380 | 149.9205873 | +2.3844960 | 24.4 | 23.4 | 24.5 | 3909.79 ± 0.47 | 2.21616 | 6.9 ± 0.7 | 2.6 ± 0.3 | ![]() |
2.21256 | 336 ± 36 | 0.01 |
| 43982e,b | 149.9766453 | +2.4416582 | 24.3 | 23.2 | 24.6 | 3883.01 ± 0.73 | 2.19413 | 6.9 ± 0.6 | 2.6 ± 0.2 | ![]() |
2.19333 | 75 ± 56 | 0.41 | |
| 46597 | 149.9415665 | +2.4688913 | 24.7 | 23.8 | 24.7 | 3857.99 ± 0.74 | 2.17355 | 3.5 ± 0.6 | 1.2 ± 0.2 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 38019d | 149.9020418 | +2.3815371 | 25.9 | 25.0 | 25.7 | 3900.36 ± 0.49 | 2.2084 | 1.5 ± 0.2 | 5.5 ± 0.7 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 40792d | 149.9444266 | +2.4094991 | 26.7 | 25.5 | 27.4 | 3901.43 ± 0.53 | 2.20928 | 2.3 ± 0.4 | 0.85 ± 0.14 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 41547d | 149.9246216 | +2.4166699 | 26.0 | 24.9 | 26.6 | 3832.08 ± 0.65 | 2.15224 | 2.5 ± 0.6 | 0.86 ± 0.21 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| 44993d | 149.9744788 | +2.4530529 | 26.5 | 25.0 | 26.5 | 3907.65 ± 0.80 | 2.2144 | 2.1 ± 0.4 | 0.78 ± 0.15 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| HUDF_maB | 17001f | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | 3705.44 ± 0.73 | 2.04806 | 22.0 ± 4.0 | 6.7 ± 1.2 | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ |
| 31000f | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | 4969.63 ± 0.47 | 3.08798 | 3.7 ± 0.6 | 3.1 ± 0.5 | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
| SXDS495B | 06713 | 34.4224906 | −5.1136338 | 24.5 | 23.5 | 24.6 | 3894.18 ± 1.02 | 2.20332 | 3.9 ± 0.2 | 1.4 ± 0.1 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ |
| 10600a | 34.4420541 | −5.0486039 | 23.7 | 23.0 | 23.6 | 3903.62 ± 0.69 | 2.21109 | 5.2 ± 0.2 | 1.9 ± 0.1 | ![]() |
2.20915 | 181 ± 53 | 0.03 | |
| 10942 | 34.4980945 | −5.0428800 | 25.6 | 24.2 | 25.6 | 3887.51 ± 0.55 | 2.19783 | 0.77 ± 0.05 | 0.28 ± 0.02 | ![]() |
2.19557 | 212 ± 42 | 0.12 | |
| 10535d | 34.4246768 | −5.0488535 | 25.9 | 24.8 | 26.2 | 3905.50 ± 0.36 | 2.21263 | 3.4 ± 0.2 | 1.3 ± 0.1 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | ⋅⋅⋅ | |
Notes. Columns: (1) Slit mask. (2) Object ID. (3) Right ascension. (4) Declination. (5)–(7) U, NB387, and B-band magnitudes. (8) Observed wavelength of Lyα measured by the asymmetric Gaussian fitting. (9) Redshift of Lyα corrected for the heliocentric motion. (10) Lyα flux uncorrected for slit loss in LRIS spectroscopy. (11) Lyα luminosity. (12) Lyα equivalent width estimated from the NB387 magnitudes. Lyα position in the transmission curve is taken into account from the spectroscopic redshift of Lyα. (13) Redshift of nebular emission lines corrected for the heliocentric motion (K. Nakajima et al. in preparation). (14) Lyα velocity offset relative to nebular emission lines. (15) Ratio of Lyα flux in the bluer side relative to the systemic redshift to total Lyα flux.
aUV continuum-detected LAEs.
bThese objects have also been observed with Magellan/MagE in Hashimoto et al. (2013).
cHashimoto et al. (2013) have reported that LAE 13636 has a ΔvLyα of
km s−1. However, the Hα line profile would have been affected by a residual of a neighboring OH line due to the low spectral resolution of their Keck-II/NIRSPEC observation (R ~ 1500), making it difficult to determine accurately the systemic redshift. Our FMOS spectroscopy with R ~ 2200 would securely detect nebular emission less affected by OH lines.
dThese objects are reduced without the Keck/LRIS public pipeline.
eAGN-like objects.
fK. Nakajima et al. (in preparation).
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4.2. Measurement of Lyα Velocity Offset
We measure the Lyα velocity offset for the eight LAEs with detections of Lyα and nebular lines:

where c, zLyα, and zsys, are the speed of light, and the Lyα and systemic redshifts, respectively. The systemic redshift is determined from nebular emission lines obtained with FMOS.
Prior to the measurement of ΔvLyα, we measure the wavelength of Lyα in the following line-fitting procedures. We use the peak wavelength of the best-fit asymmetric Gaussian profile for measurements of the Lyα wavelength. We first automatically search for an emission line in a wavelength range of 3500–4000 Å in each spectrum. This range includes the wavelength range of the NB387 filter. Next, we fit an asymmetric Gaussian profile to the detected lines. The asymmetric Gaussian profile is expressed as

where A, λ0, and f0 are the amplitude, peak wavelength of the emission line, and continuum level, respectively. The asymmetric dispersion, σasym, is represented by
, where aasym and d are the asymmetric parameter and typical width of the line, respectively. An object with a positive (negative) aasym value has a skewed line profile with a red (blue) wing. The fitting with the asymmetric Gaussian profile is efficient for Lyα line from high-z galaxies affected by complex kinematic structure of infalling and/or outflowing gas and IGM absorption. For fitting, we use data points over the wavelength range where the flux drops to 10% of its peak value at the redder and bluer sides of the emission line. We use the peak flux, the wavelength of the line peak, 0.4, 1.0 × 10−17, and 2.0 as the initial parameters of A,
, aasym, f0, and d for the line-fitting. The last two are typical values of our spectra. If profile fitting does not converge to the minimum in χ2, we search for the best fit by changing the initial value of aasym.
We show the best-fit asymmetric Gaussian profile for an example spectrum in Figure 2. We also fit a symmetric Gaussian profile to the emission lines in addition to asymmetric one. For the symmetric Gaussian fitting, we adopt two wavelength ranges where the flux drops to 70% and 10% of its peak value, and denote the corresponding peak wavelengths by
and
, respectively. The fitting procedure in the former narrow range is similar as in Hashimoto et al. (2013) in terms of avoiding systematic effects due to asymmetric line profile. As shown in Figure 2, the best-fit
is broadly equal to
for the example line. The wavelength difference is ~ + 0.1 Å (~ + 10 km s−1 at z = 2.2). In contrast,
differs from
by ~ + 0.4 Å which corresponds to a velocity difference of ~ + 30 km s−1 at z = 2.2. This is likely to be caused by the sharp drop on the blue side and the extended red tail which cannot be fit well with symmetric profiles.
Figure 2. Observed Lyα emission line (black) for an example LAE, 10600, and its best-fit profiles. The curves are the best-fit symmetric Gaussian profiles in the wavelength range where the flux drops to 70% (green) and 10% (blue) of its peak, and the asymmetric Gaussian profile (red). The vertical bold lines denote the corresponding peak wavelengths of the best-fit profiles. The peak wavelengths are 3903.77, 3904.02, and 3903.62 Å, respectively, with the central, symmetric Gaussian, and asymmetric Gaussian profiles. The vertical dashed lines indicate the wavelengths where the flux drops to 70% (gray) and 10% (black) of its peak. See details in Section 4.2.
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Standard image High-resolution imageThis trend is more clearly shown in Figure 3 which exhibits the wavelength difference of
and
from
as a function of the asymmetric parameter, aasym. The wavelengths of individual profiles are in good agreement for almost symmetric lines with aasym ~ 0. Even for moderately asymmetric profiles with |aasym|
0.2,
tends to correct for the systematic effects of skewed lines compared to
. However, both
and
are redshifted (blueshifted) from
by ~0.5–1.0 Å for highly asymmetric lines with aasym ~ +0.4 (−0.4).
Figure 3. Differences between peak wavelengths of the best-fit central (filled circles) or symmetric Gaussian (open circles) profiles and ones of asymmetric Gaussian profile for Lyα-detected objects. Right vertical axis indicates the corresponding velocity offset. See details in Section 4.2.
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Standard image High-resolution imageAfter correcting for the heliocentric motion of the Earth for the redshifts of Lyα and nebular lines,10 we calculate ΔvLyα following Equation (1). Table 2 lists the zLyα, zsys, and ΔvLyα for the 26 Lyα-detected objects observed with LRIS. Figure 4 presents Lyα spectra as a function of velocity for LAEs with detections of nebular emission lines. In Table 3, we also list these quantities of the four LAEs with detections of Lyα and nebular lines obtained by previous Magellan/IMACS observations (Nakajima et al. 2012). Almost all objects observed with LRIS have a ΔvLyα of ~200 km s−1 which is consistent with values in previous studies (e.g., Hashimoto et al. 2013). The values of ΔvLyα in the IMACS sample are calculated to be smaller than the LRIS results. This could be caused by large uncertainties due to the IMACS spectroscopy with a lower spectral resolution than LRIS.
Figure 4. Lyα emission lines as a function of velocity for the eight LAEs with detections of nebular lines.
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 3. Summary of the Lyα-detected Objects in the IMACS Spectroscopy
| Slit Mask | Object ID | λobs | zLyα | EW(Lyα) | zsys | ΔvLyα |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (Å) | (km s−1) | ||||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) |
| IMACS-SXDS | 04640 | 3865.08 ± 0.37 | 2.17938 | ![]() |
2.17822 | 110 ± 138 |
| 08204 | 3895.11 ± 5.59 | 2.20408 | ![]() |
2.20329 | 74 ± 505 | |
| 09219 | 3890.71 ± 6.08 | 2.20047 | ![]() |
2.20004 | 40 ± 508 | |
| 11135 | 3882.27 ± 0.56 | 2.19352 | ![]() |
2.19238 | 107 ± 151 |
Notes. Columns: (1) Slit mask. (2) Object ID. (3) Observed wavelength of Lyα measured by the asymmetric Gaussian fitting. (4) Redshift of Lyα corrected for the heliocentric motion. (5) Lyα equivalent width. (6) Redshift of nebular emission lines corrected for the heliocentric motion (K. Nakajima et al. in preparation). (7) Velocity offset of Lyα relative to nebular emission lines.
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Additionally, we provide a consistency check for our measurement of zLyα by using the same object as in Hashimoto et al. (2013), COSMOS-13636. The object has been observed with both of LRIS in this work and Magellan/MagE in a previous work. The redshift of Lyα estimated from the LRIS spectrum (
) is in good agreement with that of MagE (
) within a 1σ fitting error. The difference in velocity is 30 ± 70 km s−1. The large error in
is likely to be due to the lower spectral resolution of LRIS (R ~ 1000) than that of MagE (R ~ 4100).
Figure 5 shows the Hubble Space Telescope (HST)/ACS I814-band images of LAEs with a zsys measurement in the COSMOS field. Unfortunately, the LAEs in the SXDS field are not covered by the CANDELS project. Several LAEs have multiple components, which could be mergers. The merger fraction of LAEs and its Lyα dependence are discussed in Shibuya et al. (2014).
Figure 5. HST I814-band images of the LAEs with a zsys observed with Keck/LRIS in the COSMOS field. The image size is 2'' × 2''. North is up and east is to the left.
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Standard image High-resolution image4.3. Measurement of IS Velocity Offset
We measure the IS velocity offset of IS absorption lines for our LAEs. Due to the faintness of their UV continuum emission, it is difficult to detect IS absorption lines from high Lyα EW galaxies with EW
50 Å in individual spectra. However, owing to the high sensitivity of Keck/LRIS, the rest-frame UV continuum emission is clearly detected from four individual LAEs, LAE 12805, 13636, and 14212 in COSMOS, and LAE 10600 in SXDS, among the 26 Lyα-detected objects.
We first fit a power-law curve to the UV continuum emission in four individual objects in order to normalize the continuum level, and derive the properties of IS absorption lines. The normalized continuum emission in the rest frame is shown in Figure 6. Next, we fit the symmetric Gaussian profile to each IS absorption line in a wavelength range of ±5 Å around the expected line center. We summarize the best-fit peak wavelength, line depth, width, and EW in Table 4. The noise in each line is estimated from spectra at 1250–1700 Å avoiding regions close to the absorption lines. Most absorption lines are found to be detected at the >5σ levels except for several low ionization interstellar (LIS) lines.
Figure 6. Normalized UV spectra of the four continuum detected LAEs. Black and red vertical dashed lines indicates wavelengths of IS absorption and emission lines, respectively.
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 4. Absorption-line Features of the UV-continuum Detected LAEs
| Object | Ion | λrest | ![]() |
I/I0 | σ | EW(IS) | ΔvIS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (Å) | (Å) | (Å) | (km s−1) | |||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) | (8) |
| 12805 | Si ii | 1260.4221 | 1259.64 ± 0.43 | −0.69 ± 0.56 | 0.67 ± 0.58 | −1.15 ± 0.21 | −186 ± 101 |
| EW(Lyα)=33.73 [Å] | O i | 1302.1685 | 1301.02 ± 0.61 | −0.65 ± 0.33 | 0.97 ± 0.54 | −1.56 ± 0.21 | [−518 ± 139] |
| ΔvLyα = 258 [km s−1] | Si ii | 1304.3702 | 1301.02 ± 1.52 | −0.65 ± 0.33 | 0.97 ± 0.54 | −1.56 ± 0.21 | [−518 ± 139] |
| mB = 23.8 | C ii | 1334.5323 | 1333.57 ± 0.72 | −0.58 ± 0.33 | 0.90 ± 0.50 | −1.32 ± 0.21 | −215 ± 162 |
| Si iv | 1393.76018 | 1392.39 ± 1.40 | −0.22 ± 0.27 | 0.64 ± 0.76 | −0.36 ± 0.21 | −295 ± 307 | |
| Si ii | 1526.70698 | 1525.91 ± 0.36 | −0.60 ± 0.17 | 0.63 ± 0.17 | −0.94 ± 0.21 | −156 ± 71 | |
| C iv | 1548.204 | 1545.60 ± 1.05 | −0.27 ± 0.29 | 0.70 ± 0.70 | −0.48 ± 0.21 | [−750 ± 203] | |
| C iv | 1550.781 | 1545.60 ± 1.05 | −0.27 ± 0.29 | 0.70 ± 0.70 | −0.48 ± 0.21 | [−750 ± 203] | |
| Fe ii | 1608.45085 | 1607.75 ± 1.11 | −0.37 ± 0.48 | 0.49 ± 0.47 | −0.46 ± 0.19 | −131 ± 207 | |
| Al ii | 1670.7886 | 1670.90 ± 2.13 | −0.35 ± 0.37 | 1.63 ± 1.9 | −1.43 ± 0.22 | 21 ± 382 | |
| 13636 | Si ii | 1260.4221 | 1260.23 ± 0.70 | −0.21 ± 0.068 | 1.76 ± 0.65 | −0.91 ± 0.19 | −46 ± 165 |
| EW(Lyα) = 86.80 [Å] | O i | 1302.1685 | 1301.25 ± 1.20 | −0.33 ± 0.26 | 1.26 ± 1.07 | −1.05 ± 0.19 | [−465 ± 280] |
| ΔvLyα = 197 [km s−1] | Si ii | 1304.3702 | 1301.25 ± 1.20 | −0.33 ± 0.26 | 1.26 ± 1.07 | −1.05 ± 0.19 | [−465 ± 280] |
| mB = 24.1 | Si iv | 1393.76018 | 1392.80 ± 0.64 | −0.38 ± 0.15 | 1.27 ± 0.56 | −1.19 ± 0.19 | −206 ± 138 |
| Si iv | 1402.77291 | 1401.92 ± 0.62 | −0.50 ± 0.74 | 0.35 ± 0.95 | −0.44 ± 0.20 | −182 ± 134 | |
| C iv | 1548.204 | 1546.80 ± 0.83 | −0.42 ± 0.14 | 2.00 ± 0.85 | −2.09 ± 0.19 | [−518 ± 161] | |
| C iv | 1550.781 | 1546.80 ± 0.83 | −0.42 ± 0.14 | 2.00 ± 0.85 | −2.09 ± 0.19 | [−518 ± 161] | |
| Al ii | 1670.7886 | 1670.35 ± 0.62 | −0.73 ± 0.62 | 0.39 ± 0.36 | −0.71 ± 0.20 | −96 ± 112 | |
| 14212 | Si ii | 1260.4221 | 1258.98 ± 0.56 | −0.65 ± 0.31 | 0.93 ± 0.48 | −1.52 ± 0.24 | −343 ± 133 |
| EW(Lyα)=54.98 [Å] | O i | 1302.1685 | 1301.56 ± 0.74 | −0.52 ± 0.28 | 1.06 ± 0.62 | −1.37 ± 0.25 | [−394 ± 172] |
| ΔvLyα = 188 [km s−1] | Si ii | 1304.3702 | 1301.56 ± 0.74 | −0.52 ± 0.28 | 1.06 ± 0.62 | −1.37 ± 0.25 | [−394 ± 172] |
| mB = 24.0 | C ii | 1334.5323 | 1333.42 ± 0.55 | −0.69 ± 0.16 | 1.93 ± 0.55 | −3.34 ± 0.24 | −249 ± 123 |
| Si iv | 1402.77291 | 1402.54 ± 0.49 | −0.49 ± 0.15 | 1.30 ± 0.43 | −1.59 ± 0.24 | −50 ± 105 | |
| Si ii | 1526.70698 | 1525.49 ± 0.58 | −0.86 ± 0.38 | 0.96 ± 0.42 | −2.06 ± 0.24 | −238 ± 113 | |
| C iv | 1548.204 | 1545.01 ± 0.60 | −0.73 ± 0.17 | 2.32 ± 0.66 | −4.27 ± 0.30 | [−864 ± 123] | |
| C iv | 1550.781 | 1545.01 ± 0.60 | −0.73 ± 0.17 | 2.32 ± 0.66 | −4.27 ± 0.30 | [−864 ± 123] | |
| Fe ii | 1608.45085 | 1606.52 ± 1.00 | −0.32 ± 0.23 | 0.49 ± 0.40 | −0.40 ± 0.25 | −360 ± 185 | |
| 10600 | Si ii | 1260.4221 | 1258.90 ± 1.07 | −0.28 ± 0.11 | 2.34 ± 1.18 | −1.65 ± 0.19 | −363 ± 254 |
| EW(Lyα)=58.19 [Å] | O i | 1302.1685 | 1298.58 ± 0.39 | −0.61 ± 0.47 | 0.28 ± 0.18 | −0.42 ± 0.19 | [−1079 ± 90]a |
| ΔvLyα = 181 [km s−1] | Si ii | 1304.3702 | 1298.58 ± 0.39 | −0.61 ± 0.47 | 0.28 ± 0.18 | −0.42 ± 0.19 | [−1079 ± 90]a |
| mB = 23.6 | C ii | 1334.5323 | 1333.38 ± 0.45 | −0.54 ± 0.28 | 0.54 ± 0.26 | −0.74 ± 0.16 | −258 ± 100 |
| Si iv | 1393.76018 | 1392.57 ± 0.38 | −0.50 ± 0.18 | 0.74 ± 0.26 | −0.92 ± 0.16 | −256 ± 82 | |
| Si iv | 1402.77291 | 1401.64 ± 0.46 | −0.74 ± 0.35 | 0.32 ± 0.13 | −0.60 ± 0.19 | −242 ± 97 | |
| Si ii | 1526.70698 | 1525.24 ± 0.65 | −0.30 ± 0.14 | 1.00 ± 0.50 | −0.75 ± 0.18 | −289 ± 127 | |
| C iv | 1548.204 | 1546.75 ± 0.36 | −0.92 ± 0.32 | 0.69 ± 0.22 | −1.59 ± 0.19 | [−528 ± 71]b | |
| C iv | 1550.781 | 1546.75 ± 0.36 | −0.92 ± 0.32 | 0.69 ± 0.22 | −1.59 ± 0.16 | [−528 ± 71]b | |
Notes. Columns: (1) Object ID. (2) Ion. (3) Wavelength in rest frame. (4) Observed wavelength of the line. (5) Amplitude of the emission line. (6) Width of the absorption line uncorrected for the instrumental broadening. (7) Equivalent width of the line. (8) Velocity offset of emission line relative to nebular emission lines. aThe value of Δv assumes that the rest wavelength of the blend is 1303.2694 Å. bThe value of Δv assumes that the rest wavelength of the blend is 1549.479 Å.
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We calculate ΔvIS in a similar manner as for Lyα in Section 6.1. Several pairs of absorption lines such as O i λ1302-S i λ1304, and C iv λ1548-C iv λ1550 are likely to be blended at the resolution of our spectroscopy. For this reason, we define the wavelengths of the line pairs as central values between the pairs. We also derive the properties of fine-structure emission lines such as Si ii* as summarized in Table 5. We find that the velocity offsets of these ion lines from zsys are almost zero, indicating that the fine-structure emission lines also trace the systemic redshift of galaxies. This is because these emission lines come from nebular regions photoionized by radiation from massive stars (e.g., Shapley et al. 2003).
Table 5. Emission Line Features of UV-continuum Detected LAEs
| Object | Ion | λrest | ![]() |
I/I0 | σ | EW | ΔvIS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (Å) | (Å) | (Å) | (km s−1) | |||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) | (8) |
| 12805 | Si ii* | 1309.276 | 1309.26 ± 0.44 | 0.78 ± 0.37 | 0.82 ± 0.45 | 1.59 ± 0.21 | 5 ± 100 |
| O iii] | 1660.809 | 1660.58 ± 0.51 | 0.64 ± 0.49 | 0.41 ± 0.31 | 0.66 ± 0.19 | −42 ± 93 | |
| O iii] | 1666.150 | 1665.34 ± 0.45 | 0.89 ± 0.76 | 0.46 ± 0.29 | 1.02 ± 0.19 | −147 ± 81 | |
| 13636 | Si ii* | 1533.431 | 1532.97 ± 0.62 | 0.48 ± 0.40 | 0.44 ± 0.39 | 0.52 ± 0.20 | −90 ± 121 |
| O iii] | 1666.150 | 1665.92 ± 1.4 | 0.39 ± 0.30 | 1.47 ± 1.23 | 1.45 ± 0.19 | −42 ± 257 | |
| 14212 | Si ii* | 1264.738 | 1265.06 ± 0.49 | 0.80 ± 0.54 | 0.65 ± 0.45 | 1.30 ± 0.24 | 76 ± 117 |
| 10600 | Si ii* | 1264.738 | 1264.94 ± 0.61 | 0.45 ± 0.32 | 0.52 ± 0.34 | 0.59 ± 0.16 | 47 ± 144 |
| Si ii* | 1533.431 | 1534.03 ± 0.44 | 0.73 ± 0.48 | 0.22 ± 0.13 | 0.41 ± 0.18 | 116 ± 85 | |
| O iii] | 1666.150 | 1665.52 ± 0.97 | 0.37 ± 0.27 | 0.94 ± 0.69 | 0.86 ± 0.20 | −113 ± 175 | |
Notes. Columns: (1) Object ID. (2) Ion. (3) Wavelength in rest frame. (4) Observed wavelength of the line. (5) Amplitude of the emission line. (6) Width of the absorption line uncorrected for the instrumental broadening. (7) Equivalent width of the line. (8) Velocity offset of emission line relative to nebular emission lines.
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4.4. Measurement of H i Covering Fraction
We estimate the covering fraction, fc, of surrounding H i gas from the depth of low ionization IS absorption lines for our four continuum-detected LAEs. If the H i gas is distributed in a spherical shell, the depth of the lines may be related to fc. The covering fraction of any ion is estimated from

where τ, I, and I0 are optical depth of an absorption line, its residual intensity, and the continuum level, respectively. The optical depth is linked to the column density as

where f, λ, and N are the ion oscillator strength, the wavelength of the absorption line in Å, and the column density of the ion in cm−2 (km s−1)−1, respectively. Jones et al. (2013) use Si ii λ1260, 1304, and 1526 lines in order to solve the above two equations and estimate fc for gravitationally lensed LBGs at z ~ 4. They find best-fit values of N and fc by fitting observed the Si ii line profiles with the intensity as a function of N and fc, I(N, fc), derived from the above equations. In addition to the fitting to Si ii lines, they use several strong absorption lines, Si ii λ1260, O i λ1302, Si ii λ1304, C ii λ1334, and Si ii λ1526 to put a lower limit on fc via

which is a simplified case of Equation (3) when τ
1. For our LAEs, we estimate fc in the latter method for the following reasons. (1) It is relatively difficult to fit our Si ii line profiles with a low signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) due to the faintness of UV-continuum emission and low resolution of our spectroscopy. (2) Jones et al. (2013) use mainly the fc value derived in the latter method in their discussion. We would like to compare fc for LAEs with that for LBGs in the same manner.
We derive the average absorption line profile of these strong transitions as a function of velocity. In the calculation, we do not use O i λ1302 and Si ii λ1304 transitions, since they could be heavily blended owing to the low spectral resolution. The derived average line profiles are shown in Figure 7. The covering fractions are estimated to be ~0.7 for LAE 12805, ~0.3 for 13636, ~0.9 for 14212, and ~0.4 for 10600 from the residual intensity in the core of the absorption line profiles. We additionally calculate the average depth of each best-fit Gaussian profile derived in Section 4.3. This alternative is helpful to adequately estimate the depth of a profile with a low S/N. The values of fc are comparable to those derived from the average line profiles, with the exception of LAE 14212. The difference for LAE 14212 is because the fc of the average line profile is affected by a singular count of C ii λ1334 line profile.
Figure 7. Average absorption line profiles of the four continuum-detected LAEs. These profiles are the average of the strong absorption lines, Si ii λ1260, C ii λ1334, and Si ii λ1526, in the same manner as Jones et al. (2013). The transitions of O i λ1302 and Si ii λ1304 are not used, since these lines are heavily blended owing to the low spectral resolution.
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Standard image High-resolution imageThe spectral resolution of our LRIS spectroscopy is ~4 times lower than that of Jones et al. (2013), preventing us from making a fair comparison between our LAEs and LBGs. We alternatively estimate EW of strong LIS absorption lines, EW(LIS), for our UV-continuum detected LAEs, and compare with results of composite LBG spectra in Section 6.3.
5. SED FITTING
In order to derive physical properties from stellar components, we perform SED fitting to the eight LAEs with known zsys. These LAEs have been imaged in several filters in the COSMOS or SXDS surveys. We use B, V, r, i', and z' data taken with Subaru/Suprime-Cam, J data obtained with UKIRT/WFCAM, Ks data from Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope/WIRCAM (McCracken et al. 2010), and Spitzer/IRAC 3.6, 4.5, 5.8, and 8.0 μm photometry from the Spitzer legacy survey of the UDS field.
The fitting procedure is the same as in Ono et al. (2010). We create a SED of a starburst galaxy using a stellar population synthesis model, GALAXEV (Bruzual & Charlot 2003) including nebular emission (Schaerer & de Barros 2009) with a Salpeter initial mass function with lower and upper mass cutoffs of mL = 0.1 M☉ and mU = 100 M☉. We assume a constant star formation history with a metallicity of Z/Z☉ = 0.2. We use Calzetti's law (Calzetti et al. 2000) for the stellar continuum extinction E(B − V). These parameters are selected to be the same as those used in Hashimoto et al. (2013) for consistency. The IGM absorption is applied to the spectra using the model of Madau (1995). The best-fit parameters and model spectra are shown in Table 6 and Figure 8, respectively. The best-fit stellar mass of our LAEs ranges from log M* ~ 9 to ~10 which is broadly comparable to that of LBGs. This is because we choose bright objects from our LAE sample for the spectroscopic observations. Thus, the small ΔvLyα of LAEs does not appear to be caused by a difference in stellar mass between LAEs and LBGs.
Figure 8. Results of SED fitting for the eight LAEs with a ΔvLyα measurement. Red lines indicate the best-fit model spectra. Black filled squares represent observed magnitudes. Red crosses denote the flux densities at individual filters expected from the best-fit model spectra.
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 6. SED Fitting Results for LAEs with a Systemic Redshift
| Slit Mask | Object | SFR | E(B − V) | log M* | ![]() |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (M☉ yr−1) | (M☉) | ||||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) |
| COSMOS | 12805 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
6.6 |
| 13138 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
1.7 | |
| 13636 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
3.3 | |
| 14212 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
13 | |
| 08357 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
0.6 | |
| COSMOS3B | 38380 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
1.4 |
| SXDS495B | 10600 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
4.7 |
| 10942 | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
0.4 | |
Notes. Columns: (1) Slit mask. (2) Object ID. (3) SFR. (4) Dust extinction. (5) Stellar mass. (6) Reduced χ2 of the SED fitting.
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6. RESULTS
6.1. Difference in ΔvLyα between LAEs and LBGs
In this section, we statistically investigate the difference in ΔvLyα between LAEs and LBGs in a compilation of LAEs with a ΔvLyα measurement in the previous studies including our 12 LAEs. The Lyα velocity offsets have previously been estimated for two objects in McLinden et al. (2011), three in the HETDEX survey (Finkelstein et al. 2011; Chonis et al. 2013), four from Hashimoto et al. (2013), and two LAEs in the MUSYC project (Guaita et al. 2013) at z ~ 2–3. Table 7 summarizes EW(Lyα) and ΔvLyα of the LAEs in these studies. Among the objects in previous studies, COSMOS 13636 from (Hashimoto et al. 2013) is included in our sample of the 12 LAEs. We combine these 11 LAEs with our new 11, and construct a large sample consisting of 22 objects, which doubles the number of LAEs with ΔvLyα measurements. Figure 9 shows the histogram of ΔvLyα using the newly enlarged sample. This is the updated version of Figure 6 in Hashimoto et al. (2013). Similar to Hashimoto et al. (2013), we confirm that ΔvLyα of LAEs is systematically smaller than the values of LBGs. We carry out the non-parametric Kolmogorov–Smirnov (K-S) test for the two populations. The K-S probability is calculated to be ~10−7, indicating that ΔvLyα is definitively different between LBGs and LAEs. The weighted mean of the 22 objects is ΔvLyα = 234 ± 9 km s−1.
Figure 9. Histograms of Lyα velocity offset for the 22 LAEs in this study and literatures (McLinden et al. 2011; Finkelstein et al. 2011; Hashimoto et al. 2013; Guaita et al. 2013; Chonis et al. 2013), and 41 LBGs given by Steidel et al. (2010).
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 7. Properties of the NB-selected Galaxies with Detections of Lyα and Nebular Emission Lines in the Previous Studies
| Object | zsys | EW(Lyα) | ΔvLyα | SFR | E(B − V) | log M* | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Å) | (km s−1) | (M☉ yr−1) | (M☉) | ||||
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) | (8) |
| McLinden et al. (2011) | |||||||
| LAE27878 | 3.11879 | ![]() |
125 ± 17.3 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | a |
[O iii]λ5007 |
| LAE40844 | 3.11170 | ![]() |
342 ± 18.3 | ![]() |
⋅⋅⋅ | a |
|
| Finkelstein et al. (2011) and Chonis et al. (2013) | |||||||
| HPS 194 | 2.28628 | 114 ± 13 | 303 ± 28 | >29.3b | 0.09 ± 0.06 | ![]() |
HETDEX sample |
| HPS 256 | 2.49024 | 206 ± 65 | ![]() |
>35.4b | 0.10 ± 0.09 | ![]() |
Hβ, [O iii]λ4959, [O iii]λ5007, Hα |
| HPS 251 | 2.28490 | 140 ± 43 | ![]() |
>9.9b | 0.07 ± 0.08 | ![]() |
|
| Hashimoto et al. (2013) | |||||||
| CDFS-3865 | 2.17210 | ![]() |
![]() |
b |
![]() |
![]() |
Subaru NB387 sample |
| CDFS-6482 | 2.20443 | ![]() |
![]() |
b |
![]() |
![]() |
[O iii]λ5007, Hα |
| COSMOS-13636 | 2.16125c | ![]() |
c |
b |
![]() |
![]() |
|
| COSMOS-30679 | 2.19776 | ![]() |
![]() |
b |
![]() |
![]() |
|
| Guaita et al. (2013) | |||||||
| LAE27 | 3.0830 | 25.7 | 167.8 ± 105.3 | ⋅⋅⋅ | ![]() |
MUSYC sample | |
| z3LAE2 | 3.1118 | 23.8 | 221.8 ± 90.0 | ⋅⋅⋅ | ![]() |
![]() |
Hβ, [O iii]λ4959, [O iii]λ5007 |
Notes. Columns: (1) Object ID. (2) Systemic redshift. (3) Lyα equivalent width. (4) Lyα velocity offset. (5) SFR. (6) Dust extinction. (7) Stellar mass. (8) Comments. aEstimated in Rhoads et al. (2014). bBased on Hα flux. cThe ΔvLyα of this object is calculated to be 197 ± 102 km s−1 in our FMOS observation with higher spectral resolution than that of the Keck-II/NIRSPEC spectrosocpy in Hashimoto et al. (2013) (see Table 2).
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We plot EW(Lyα) and ΔvLyα of our new sample in the right panel of Figure 10. We confirm the anti-correlation between EW(Lyα) and ΔvLyα in high-z star-forming galaxies including objects with a high Lyα EW (Hashimoto relation) suggested by Hashimoto et al. (2013). The larger sample clarifies that ΔvLyα decreases with increasing EW(Lyα). A similar trend has been found for UV-continuum selected galaxies at z ~ 2–3. Shapley et al. (2003) have calculated velocity offsets between Lyα emission and IS absorption (Δvem–abs) for composite spectra of LBGs, and have investigated relation between Lyα EW and Δvem–abs. Four LBG subsamples divided according to their Lyα EW reveal a trend that Lyα EW increases with decreasing Δvem–abs in the EW range of −15 to +50 Å. The Δvem–abs of our UV-continuum detected LAEs is very consistent with the trend of Shapley et al. (2003), as shown in the top panel of Figure 11. Nevertheless, Lyα and IS velocity offsets from zsys would be capable of distinguishing effects of Lyα resonant scattering and galactic outflow on Δvem–abs.
Figure 10. Rest-frame Lyα EW as a function of ΔvLyα (right) and ΔvIS (left). The red and magenta squares indicates LAEs observed with Keck/LRIS and Magellan/IMACS, respectively. The purple open symbols denote LAEs in the previous studies, (squares; McLinden et al. 2011), (triangles; Finkelstein et al. 2011; Chonis et al. 2013), (circles; Hashimoto et al. 2013), and (pentagons; Guaita et al. 2013). The black open circles with error bars represent the average EW in each ΔvLyα bin. The large red circle in the left panel depicts the weighted mean of the four continuum-detected LAEs. The blue symbol denotes the average of 41 LBGs, with the error bars corresponding to the 68th percentiles of the ΔvLyα and ΔvIS distributions (Steidel et al. 2010) and the EW distribution (Reddy et al. 2008).
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Standard image High-resolution imageFigure 11. Top: velocity offset between Lyα emission and LIS absorption lines as a function of EW(Lyα). Bottom: EW of LIS absorption lines as a function of EW(Lyα). The black filled squares indicate the UV-continuum detected LAEs. The gray open and filled circles denote composite LBG spectra at z ~ 3 (Shapley et al. 2003) and z ~ 4 (Jones et al. 2012), respectively. The EW(LIS) of LAEs is the average equivalent width of six strong LIS absorption lines, Si ii 1260, O i+Si ii 1303, C ii 1334, Si ii 1526, Fe ii 1608, and Al ii 1670.
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Standard image High-resolution image6.2. Difference in ΔvIS between LAEs and LBGs
We additionally examine a possible difference in ΔvIS between LAEs and LBGs. The weighted means of ΔvIS of the absorption lines are calculated to be −134 ± 67, −261 ± 48, −216 ± 56, and −169 ± 52 km s−1 for LAE 13636, 10600, 14212, and 12805, respectively. In the calculation of the average ΔvIS for each object, we exclude several line pairs with a large ΔvIS of
− 500 km s−1 which are not reliably determined due to a line blending. As shown in Table 4, we find that almost all IS absorption lines are blueshifted with respect to zsys by
− 200 km s−1, which indicates that gaseous outflows are present in the continuum-detected LAEs.
The left panel in Figure 10 represents the relation between EW(Lyα) and ΔvIS. The average of the four is ΔvIS = −204 ± 27 km s−1, which is comparable to that of LBGs (e.g., Erb et al. 2006b; Steidel et al. 2010) in contrast to ΔvLyα, although the current small sample of LAEs with a ΔvIS is insufficient to provide a definitive conclusion for ΔvIS of LAEs and LBGs.
6.3. Difference in fc between LAEs and LBGs
We compare the H i covering fraction fc of LAEs derived in Section 4.4 with that of z ~ 2–3 LBGs in Jones et al. (2013). Note that here we place lower limits on fc when τ
1. Figure 12 displays the relation between fc and Lyα EW, indicating a tentative trend that fc decreases with Lyα EW. This trend has already been found in Jones et al. (2013) using an LBG sample. We find that the trend continues in objects with a higher Lyα EW. Our slope of the trend is slightly steeper than that in Jones et al. (2013), which would result from the wider dynamic range in Lyα EW. However, this trend could arise from the difference in the spectral resolution, although this tendency may marginally be found for LAEs alone. In addition to fc, we compare EW(LIS) between LAEs and z = 3–4 LBGs in the bottom panel of Figure 11. Shapley et al. (2003) have found that EW(LIS) decreases with increasing EW(Lyα) with composite spectra of LBGs. Our LAEs with EW(Lyα) = 30–90 Å follow the trend between EW(Lyα) and EW(LIS), which might be indicative of a low velocity dispersion and/or low fc, as suggested by Shapley et al. (2003). These results related to the low fc imply the need for modeling Lyα line profiles emitted from a non-spherical shell of neutral gas (e.g., Zheng & Wallace 2013; Behrens et al. 2014).
Figure 12. Covering fraction of H i gas, fc, as a function of Lyα EW. The fc values of the four LAEs are estimated from the depth of the average values in the individual profile-fitting (open squares; Table 4) and average LIS absorption line profiles (filled squares; Figure 7). The gray circles indicate LBGs at z = 2–3 in Jones et al. (2013). The dashed line denotes a linear fit to the data.
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Standard image High-resolution image7. DISCUSSION
7.1. Origin of Small ΔvLyα in LAEs
As described in the previous sections, we definitely confirm the anti-correlation between ΔvLyα and Lyα EW by using a larger LAE sample than previously available. In this section, we explore the physical origin of the small ΔvLyα in high Lyα EW galaxies.
Models predict that the redshift of the Lyα emission line should increase with either outflow velocity or neutral hydrogen column density (NH i) (Verhamme et al. 2006, 2008). We have shown that the outflow velocities of LAE are comparable to those of LBGs, so the smaller ΔvLyα for LAE is likely to be due to lower column densities in these objects.
In order to address the origin of the small ΔvLyα in LAEs, we introduce the velocity offset ratio,

The value of
could trace purely physical properties such as NH i and the dust amount by excluding the kinematic effect of a bulk outflow, since the quantity is normalized by the outflowing velocity, as suggested in (Verhamme et al. 2006). Hashimoto et al. (2013) infer the average value of ΔvIS for LAEs from a stacked spectrum of four LAEs with a zsys, and compare
between LAEs and LBGs. In the stacking analysis,
is found to be ~1 for LAEs which is slightly smaller than that of LBGs, but the uncertainties are large.
Here, we estimate
for the four continuum-detected LAEs, and compare the quantities with those of z = 2–3 LBGs in Erb et al. (2006a, 2006b). In the comparison, we use LBGs with a negative ΔvIS value that indicates the outflow is present. The LAEs have a
of ~0.6–1.4, while LBGs have a wide variety of the quantity from 0 to ~10. Nevertheless, the average
for the LAEs is systematically smaller than that of LBGs. This indicates that LAEs tend to have a small NH i compared to LBGs based on the expanding gas shell model of Verhamme et al. (2006). The small
in LAEs would be indicative of a small NH i in LAEs.
Next, we examine possible correlations of ΔvLyα and
with physical properties inferred from the SED fitting (Section 5). The physical properties of LAEs with ΔvLyα in the literature are given in Table 7. In correlation tests, ΔvLyα and
correlate most strongly with mass-related quantities and star formation rate (SFR), respectively. Figures 13 and 14 show the correlations of these quantities, respectively, including LAEs and LBGs with a zsys in the literature. The SFR value of several LAEs is based on a Hα flux through the relation of Kennicutt (1998). The SFR based on a Hα flux is found to be comparable to the value inferred from SED fitting (Hashimoto et al. 2013). We conduct Spearman rank correlation tests in order to find the most related physical quantities to ΔvLyα and
in the same manner as Steidel et al. (2010). Table 8 summarizes the results of the Spearman rank correlation tests.
Figure 13. Correlations between ΔvLyα and physical properties inferred from the SED fitting. The symbols are the same as Figure 10. We multiply the physical quantities of LBGs in Erb et al. (2006a) by 1.8, because they use a Chabrier initial mass function (Chabrier 2003) in the SED fitting.
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Standard image High-resolution imageFigure 14. Same as Figure 13, but for
. Red squares indicate the four UV continuum-detected LAEs.
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Standard image High-resolution imageTable 8. Correlations between Lyα Kinematics and Galaxy Properties
| Quantity | ΔvLyα | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) |
| SFR | 0.065 | 53 | 0.241 | 31 |
| sSFR | −0.098 | 51 | −0.852 | 31 |
| E(B − V) | 0.792 | 56 | 0.272 | 34 |
| M* | 0.001 | 52 | 0.810 | 31 |
Notes. Columns: (1) Physical quantity. (2) Probabilities satisfying the null hypothesis that the quantities are not correlated in Spearman rank correlation tests. A smaller absolute value of the probabilities implies that a physical property more correlates with a Lyα velocity offset. Negative values indicates anti-correlations. (3) Number of galaxies in the correlation test between ΔvLyα and physical quantities. (4)–(5) Probabilities and galaxy numbers in the correlation tests for
. Two LBGs with an extremely high
value of >25 are excluded in the correlation tests.
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For Lyα velocity offsets, we find that the ΔvLyα strongly correlates with SFR and stellar mass, which has not been observed previously in an LBG sample (Steidel et al. 2010). These correlations may have merged because our sample covers larger dynamic ranges of SFR and M*. The correlation between ΔvLyα and specific SFR (sSFR) may arise from the stellar mass.
As far as the velocity offset ratio is concerned, we do not find a notable correlation between
and the physical properties. Nonetheless, the correlation tests indicate that
most correlates with SFR among the four physical quantities. The correlation may reflect the connection between star formation and NH i, if
is sensitive to NH i. A larger sample of LAEs with a
measurement might reveal its physical connections with galactic properties.
7.2. What is the Physical Origin of Strong Lyα Emission?
With our larger sample of LAEs with a zsys, we conclusively confirm that LAEs typically have a smaller ΔvLyα than LBGs with a lower Lyα EW, while their outflowing velocities are similar in the two populations. These results yield a small
in LAEs, which indicates a small NH i in galaxies with a high Lyα EW. The anti-correlations of fc and EW(LIS) with Lyα EW in Figures 12 and 11 are consistent with the small NH i in LAEs. The patchy H i gas clouds surrounding the central source would lead to a small flux-averaged NH i corresponding to a small
. In this condition, Lyα photons could easily escape less affected by resonant scattering in the clouds. The results of our kinematic analyses support the idea that the H i column density is a key quantity determining Lyα emissivity.
Moreover, recent NIR spectroscopy by Nakajima et al. (2013) has suggested that LAEs have a large [O iii]/[O ii] ratio, indicating these systems are highly ionized with density-bounded H ii regions. This tendency has been confirmed by a subsequent systematic study in Nakajima & Ouchi (2013). The large [O iii]/[O ii] ratio also indicates a low column density of H i gas. A stacked UV continuum spectrum of our eight LAEs shows that LIS absorption lines have a low EW, as shown in Figures 15 (see also Figure 11). The weak LIS absorption lines are consistent with a large [O iii]/[O ii] ratio in LAEs (e.g., Jones et al. 2012).
Figure 15. Composite rest-frame UV spectra of the eight LAEs observed with Keck/LRIS (red) and LBGs in Shapley et al. (2003, blue). The spectra are normalized to unity in the continuum levels. Black and red vertical dashed lines indicates wavelengths of IS absorption and emission lines, respectively.
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Standard image High-resolution imageIn our first paper of the series investigating LAE structures, we find that LAEs with a high Lyα EW tend to be a non-merger, to show a small Lyα spatial offset between Lyα and stellar continuum emission δLyα, and to have a small ellipticity by using a large sample of 426 LAEs (Shibuya et al. 2014). On the basis of these results on the gas distribution, the difference in H i column density explains the Lyα-EW dependences of the merger fraction, the Lyα spatial offset, and the galaxy inclination. For objects with density-bounded H ii regions, Lyα photons would directly escape from central ionizing sources, which produce a small δLyα. The low H i abundance along the line of sight also induces the preferential escape of Lyα to the face-on direction.
All of the above results suggest that ionized regions with small amounts of H i gas dominate in galaxies with a high Lyα.
8. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
We carry out deep optical spectroscopy for our large sample of LAEs at z = 2.2 in order to detect their Lyα lines with Keck/LRIS. We compare redshifts of the Lyα and nebular emission lines detected with Subaru/FMOS, and calculate ΔvLyα for new 11 LAEs. This observation doubles the sample size of LAEs with a ΔvLyα measurement in literatures.
The conclusions of this study are summarized below.
- 1.Almost all of our new LAEs have a ΔvLyα of ~200 km s−1 which is systematically smaller than that of LBGs. Using 22 LAEs with ΔvLyα measurements taken from our new observations and the literature, we definitively confirm the anti-correlation between Lyα EW and ΔvLyα suggested by previous work.
- 2.Long exposure times and the high sensitivity of LRIS at blue wavelengths enabled us to successfully detect IS absorption lines against faint UV continua from four individual LAEs. These IS absorption lines are found to be blueshifted from the systemic redshift by 200–300 km s−1, indicating strong gaseous outflows are present even in LAEs.
- 3.We estimate
(≡ ΔvLyα/ΔvIS) that would be a quantity sensitive to NH i for the four UV continuum-detected LAEs. We find the value of
in LAEs to be smaller than that of LBGs, indicating a lower NH i in LAEs. We performed a test for correlations between
and physical properties inferred from SED fitting. As a result, we tentatively conclude that SFR may be most closely related to
. The correlation may suggest that the star formation preferentially occurs in systems with large amounts of neutral hydrogen gas, which would have a larger value of
. - 4.We estimate the covering fraction, fc, of surrounding H i gas from the depth of LIS absorption lines the four LAEs. We identify a tentative trend for fc to decrease with increasing Lyα EW, as suggested by a study for LBGs in Jones et al. (2013). A central source being covered by patchy H i gas clouds would lead to a small flux-averaged NH i corresponding to a small
. In this condition, Lyα photons could easily escape less affected by resonant scattering in the clouds. - 5.The results of our kinematic analyses support the idea that the H i column density is a key quantity determining Lyα emissivity.
In this kinematic study, we obtain ΔvIS,
, and fc only for objects with a moderate Lyα EW of 20–100 Å which overlaps with the Lyα EW range of LBG samples in e.g., Shapley et al. (2003). We need to estimate these quantities for objects with a higher Lyα EW in order to check whether such objects follow the kinematic trends found in this study.
We thank Anne Verhamme, Zheng Zheng, Lennox L. Cowie, Esther M. Hu, and James E. Rhoads for useful discussions, and an anonymous referee, Mark Dijkstra, and Lucia Guaita for constructive comments. This paper is based on data collected with the Subaru Telescope, which is operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. Some of the data presented herein were obtained at the W.M. Keck Observatory, which is operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W.M. Keck Foundation. The reduction pipeline used to reduce the LRIS data was developed at UC Berkeley with support from NSF grant AST-0071048. This work is based on observations taken by the CANDELS Multi-Cycle Treasury Program with the NASA/ESA HST, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS5-26555. The NB387 data used in this work were collected at the Subaru Telescope, which is operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. This work is based in part on observations made with the Spitzer Space Telescope, which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with NASA. Support for this work was provided by NASA through an award issued by JPL/Caltech. This work was supported by World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI Initiative), MEXT, Japan. This work was supported by KAKENHI (23244025) and (21244013) Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (A) through Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). M.R. was supported by NSF grant AST-1108815.
Facilities: Subaru (Suprime-Cam, FMOS) - Subaru Telescope, Keck:I (LRIS) - KECK I Telescope, Magellan:Baade (IMACS) - Magellan I Walter Baade Telescope.
Footnotes
- *
Based on data obtained with the Subaru Telescope operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.
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The first paper presents a study on LAE structures (Shibuya et al. 2014).
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