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The average submillimetre properties of Lyman-alpha Blobs at z=3

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posted on 2023-06-09, 01:18 authored by N K Hine, J E Geach, Y Matsuda, B D Lehmer, M J Michalowski, D Farrah, M Spaans, Seb OliverSeb Oliver, D J B Smith, S C Chapman, T Jenness, D M Alexander, I Robson, P van der Werf
Ly-alpha blobs (LABs) offer insight into the complex interface between galaxies and their circumgalactic medium. Whilst some LABs have been found to contain luminous star-forming galaxies and active galactic nuclei that could potentially power the Ly-alpha emission, others appear not to be associated with obvious luminous galaxy counterparts. It has been speculated that LABs may be powered by cold gas streaming on to a central galaxy, providing an opportunity to directly observe the `cold accretion' mode of galaxy growth. Star-forming galaxies in LABs could be dust obscured and therefore detectable only at longer wavelengths. We stack deep SCUBA-2 observations of the SSA22 field to determine the average 850um flux density of 34 LABs. We measure S_850 = 0.6 +/- 0.2mJy for all LABs, but stacking the LABs by size indicates that only the largest third (area > 1794 kpc^2) have a mean detection, at 4.5 sigma, with S_850 = 1.4 +/- 0.3mJy. Only two LABs (1 and 18) have individual SCUBA-2 > 3.5 sigma detections at a depth of 1.1mJy/beam. We consider two possible mechanisms for powering the LABs and find that central star formation is likely to dominate the emission of Ly-alpha, with cold accretion playing a secondary role.

Funding

STFc

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Accepted version

Journal

Monthly Notices Of The Royal Astronomical Society

ISSN

0035-8711

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Issue

4

Volume

460

Page range

4075-4085

Department affiliated with

  • Physics and Astronomy Publications

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2016-05-18

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2016-08-11

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2016-05-18

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