English

ALMA resolves the first strongly-lensed Optical/NIR-dark galaxy

Astrophysics of Galaxies 2023-02-15 v1

Abstract

We present high-resolution (0.1\lesssim0.1arcsec) ALMA observations of the strongly-lensed galaxy HATLASJ113526.2-01460 at redshift z3.1z\sim3.1 discovered in the Gama 12th^{\rm th} field of the Herschel-ATLAS survey. The gravitationally lensed system is remarkably peculiar in that neither the background source nor the foreground lens show a clearly detected optical/NIR emission. We perform accurate lens modeling and source morphology reconstruction in three different (sub-)mm continuum bands, and in the C[II] and CO(8-7) spectral lines. The modeling indicates a foreground lensing (likely elliptical) galaxy with mass 1011M\gtrsim10^{11}\, M_\odot at z1.5z\gtrsim1.5, while the source (sub-)mm continuum and line emissions are amplified by factors μ613\mu\sim6-13. We estimate extremely compact sizes 0.5\lesssim0.5 kpc for the star-forming region and 1\lesssim 1 kpc for the gas component, with no clear evidence of rotation or of ongoing merging events. We perform broadband SED-fitting and retrieve the intrinsic de-magnified physical properties of the source, which is found to feature a very high star-formation rate 103M\gtrsim10^3\, M_\odot yr1^{-1}, that given the compact sizes is on the verge of the Eddington limit for starbursts; the radio luminosity at 6 cm from available EVLA observations is consistent with the star-formation activity. The galaxy is found to be extremely rich in gas 1011M\sim10^{11}\, M_\odot and dust 109M\gtrsim10^9\, M_\odot. The stellar content 1011M\lesssim10^{11}\, M_\odot places the source well above the main sequence of starforming galaxies, indicating that the starburst is rather young with estimated age 108\sim10^8 yr. Our results indicate that the overall properties of HATLASJ113526.2-01460 are consistently explained by in-situ galaxy formation and evolution scenarios.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2207.00466,
  title  = {ALMA resolves the first strongly-lensed Optical/NIR-dark galaxy},
  author = {M. Giulietti and A. Lapi and M. Massardi and M. Behiri and M. Torsello and Q. D'Amato and T. Ronconi and F. Perrotta and A. Bressan},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2207.00466},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

17 Pages, 12 Figures, 7 Tables. Submitted to ApJ

R2 v1 2026-06-24T12:11:15.834Z