Related papers: Dust Biasing of Damped Lyman Alpha Systems: a Baye…
We estimate the intrinsic neutral gas density in Damped Lyman Alpha systems ($\Omega_{HI}^{(DLA)}$) in the redshift range $ 2.2 \lesssim z \lesssim 5$ from the DLA SDSS DR_3 sample of optically selected quasars. We take into account…
Although damped Lyman alpha (DLA) systems are usually considered metal-poor, it has been suggested that this could be due to observational bias against metal-enriched absorbers. I review recent surveys to quantify the particular issue of…
We present metal abundances in 15 damped Lyman alpha systems (DLAs) from the Complete Optical and Radio Absorption Line System (CORALS) survey, designed to be free from any biasing effects due to extinction of QSOs by dust in intervening…
We present a new study of the effects of quasar obscuration on the statistics of Damped Ly alpha (DLA) systems. We show that the extinction of any Galactic or extragalactic HI region increases with the column density of zinc with a turning…
The dust-content of damped Lyman-alpha systems (DLAs) is an important observable for understanding their origin and the neutral gas reservoirs of galaxies. While the average colour-excess of DLAs, E(B-V), is known to be <15 milli-magnitudes…
(Abridged) We present the first results from the Complete Optical and Radio Absorption Line System (CORALS) survey. We have compiled a homogeneous sample of radio-selected QSOs from the Parkes Catalogue and searched for damped Lyman alpha…
We present a systematic study of the impact of a dust bias on samples of damped Lyman-$\alpha$ absorbers (DLAs). This bias arises as an effect of the magnitude and colour criteria utilized in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) quasar…
We present the results from the optical component of a survey for damped Lyman-alpha systems (DLAs) towards radio-loud quasars. Our quasar sample is drawn from the Texas radio survey with the following primary selection criteria: z_em >…
We have studied a sample of 1084 intervening absorption systems with 2.15$\le z_{ab}\le$5.2, having log(N$_{\rm HI}$) $>$ 20.0 in the spectra of QSOs in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data release 7 (DR7), with the aim of understanding the…
We searched for evidence of reddening of background SDSS QSO spectra due to dust in intervening DLA systems. We utilise the Data Releases 5 and 7 to arrive at sample sizes of 475 (DR5) and 676 (DR7) absorbers, based on two different…
We present arguments based on the measured abundances in individual damped Lyman alpha systems (DLAs) and sub-damped Lyman alpha systems (sub-DLAs), and also the average abundances inferred in large samples of QSO absorption line systems,…
Utilizing a new, high mass resolution hydrodynamic simulation we compute the metallicity evolution of damped Lyman alpha systems (DLAs) and find a reasonable agreement with observations. In particular, the observed slow evolution of the DLA…
We use Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 2 QSO spectra to constrain the dust-reddening caused by intervening damped Lyman-alpha systems (DLAs). Comparing the spectral index distribution of a 70 sight-line DLA sample with that of a large…
We present a detailed analysis of a red quasar at z=2.32 with an intervening damped Lyman-alpha absorber (DLA) at z=2.13. Using high quality data from the X-shooter spectrograph at ESO Very Large Telescope we find that the absorber has a…
As large optical quasar surveys for damped Lya become a reality and the study of star forming gas in the early Universe achieves statistical robustness, it is now vital to identify and quantify the sources of systematic error. Because the…
We show that the extinction of quasar absorbers increases exponentially with the logarithmic column density of any volatile metal (e.g. zinc), with a charateristic turning point above which the quasars are severely dimmed. We derive the…
Studies of elemental abundances are a fundamental tool for unveiling the nature of the high-redshift (proto-)galaxies associated to Damped Ly alpha systems (DLAs). The present contribution analyses the impact of dust and ionization effects…
The presence of dust in quasar absorbers, such as damped Lyman alpha (DLA) systems, may cause the background QSO to appear reddened. We investigate the extent of this potential reddening by comparing the optical-to-infrared (IR) colors of…
To fully exploit the potential of quasars as probes of cosmic chemical evolution and the internal gas dynamics of galaxies it is important to understand the selection effects behind the quasar samples and in particular if the selection…
We explore the redshift evolution of the metal content of damped Lyman alpha systems (DLAs) with new observations of four absorbers at z < 1.5 . The main conclusion is that the column density--weighted mean metallicity, [<Zn/H>] = -1.03 +/-…