Models for High-Redshift Lyman Alpha Emitters
Abstract
We present models for dusty high-redshift Lyman alpha emitting galaxies by combining the Press-Schechter formalism with a treatment of inhomogeneous dust distribution inside galaxies. These models reproduce the surface density of emitters inferred from recent observations, and also agree with previous non-detections. Although a detailed determination of the individual model parameters is precluded by uncertainties, we find that (i) the dust content of primordial galaxies builds up in no more than 5x10^8 years, (ii) the galactic HII regions are inhomogeneous with a cloud covering factor of order unity, and (iii) the overall star formation efficiency is at least 5 percent. Future observations should be able to detect Lyman alpha galaxies upto redshifts of about z=8. If the universe is reionized at z(reion)<8, the corresponding decline in the number of Lyman alpha emitters at z>z(reion) could prove to be a useful probe of the reionization epoch.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/9811396,
title = {Models for High-Redshift Lyman Alpha Emitters},
author = {Zoltan Haiman and Marco Spaans},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/9811396},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
4 pages, poster contribution to Proc. of 9th Annual October Astrophysics Conference in Maryland, "After the Dark Ages: When Galaxies Were Young (the Universe at 2 < z < 5", College Park, October 1998