Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos

Details Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos

2000-03-24

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0003366v1

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

Submitted to ApJ Letters

Scientific paper

10.1086/312754

The baryons inside high-redshift halos with virial temperatures above T=10^4 K cool radiatively as they condense inside dark matter potential wells. We show that the release of the gravitational binding energy, over the halo assembly time-scale, results in a significant and detectable Ly alpha flux. At the limiting line flux of approximately 10^-19 erg/s/cm^2/asec^2 of the Next Generation Space Telescope, several sufficiently massive halos, with velocity dispersions above sigma=120 km/s, would be visible per 4'x4' field. The halos would have characteristic angular sizes of approximately 10 asec, would be detectable in a broad-band survey out to redshifts z=6-8, and would provide a direct probe of galaxies in the process of forming. They may be accompanied by HeII Ly alpha emission at the 10 percent level, but remain undetectable at other wavelengths. Our predictions are in good agreement with the recent finding of two Ly alpha ``blobs'' at z=3.1 by Steidel et al. (1999).

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Lyman Alpha Cooling Radiation from High-Redshift Halos will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-369984