Unveiling the Galaxy Counterparts of Damped Lyman-alpha Absorbers using GRB-DLAs

Details Unveiling the Galaxy Counterparts of Damped Lyman-alpha Absorbers using GRB-DLAs Unveiling the Galaxy Counterparts of Damped Lyman-alpha Absorbers using GRB-DLAs

May 2007

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2007sptz.prop40599c&link_type=abstract

Spitzer Proposal ID #40599

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Scientific paper

Damped Lyman-alpha systems (DLAs) have primarily been detected along the line of sight to bright quasars (QSOs) through absorption line spectroscopy. They harbor the bulk of the neutral gas in the Universe between redshifts of 02 since the QSO overwhelms the light from the DLA by a factor of 10. The launch of Swift has enabled localization of the optical counterpart of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) while they are still bright. Prompt, high resolution spectroscopy of these afterglows, which briefly outshine the brightest quasars, reveals a rich forest of absorption features providing an unprecedented window into the star-forming environments of distant galaxies. GRB hosts show higher metallicities, higher neutral gas column densities and depletion onto dust grains compared to QSO-DLAs. This can be attributed to the fact that QSO sight lines are more likely to cross the extended outer regions of intervening systems. GRBs on the other hand, due to their association with massive stars, provide an unbiased tracer of star-forming environments before the molecular cloud is destroyed by feedback. As a result, GRB hosts are the strongest candidates for bridging the evolutionary chasm between Lyman-break galaxies (LBGs) and QSO-DLAs. We propose Spitzer 3.6 and 24 micron imaging of the complete sample of 35 GRB host galaxies with well-characterized absorption line properties and spectroscopic redshifts in the range 2

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