Related papers: An Excess of Mg II Absorbers in BL Lac Objects

In order to investigate the origin of the excess of strong MgII systems towards GRB afterglows as compared to QSO sightlines, we have measured the incidence of MgII absorbers towards a third class of objects: the Blazars. This class…

We present a study of strong intervening absorption systems in the near-IR spectra of 31 luminous quasars at $z>5.7$. The quasar spectra were obtained with {\it Gemini} GNIRS that provide continuous wavelength coverage from $\sim$0.9 to…

The startling discovery of Prochter et al. (2006) that the frequency of very strong (W_r(2796)>1 A) MgII absorbers along gamma-ray burst (GRB) lines of sight ([dN/dz]_{GRB} = 0.90) is more than three times the frequency along quasar lines…

We find multiple Mg II absorption systems at redshift z=1.66, 2.069, and 2.097 in the spatially resolved spectra of the quadruply gravitationally lensed quasar H1413+1143 utilizing the Kyoto tridimensional spectrograph II (Kyoto 3DII)…

We examine the recent report by Prochter et al. (2006) that gamma-ray burst (GRB) sight lines have a much higher incidence of strong MgII absorption than quasar sight lines. We propose that the discrepancy is due to the different beam sizes…

In 2006, Prochter et al. reported a statistically significant enhancement of very strong Mg II absorption systems intervening the sightlines to gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) relative to the in- cidence of such absorption along quasar sightlines.…

We present an initial survey of Mg II absorption characteristics in the halos of a carefully constructed, volume-limited subsample of galaxies embedded in the spectroscopic part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. We observed quasars near…

Context: A significantly higher incidence of strong (rest equivalent width W_r > 1 {\AA}) intervening Mg II absorption is observed along gamma-ray burst (GRB) sight-lines relative to those of quasar sight-lines. A geometrical explanation…

The incidence of strong MgII systems in gamma-ray burst (GRB) spectra is a few times higher than in quasar (QSO) spectra. We investigate several possible explanations for this effect, including: dust obscuration bias, clustering of the…

We present results from an imaging and spectroscopic study of four strong MgII absorbers of W(2796) >~ 1 Ang revealed by the afterglow of GRB060418 at z_GRB=1.491. These absorbers, at z=0.603,0.656,1.107 and z_GRB, exhibit large ion…

We study the frequency of Mg II absorption in the outer haloes of galaxies at z = 0.6 - 1.4 (with median z = 0.87), using new spectra obtained of ten background quasars with galaxy impact parameters of b < 100 kpc. The quasar sightlines…

We present r'- or i'-band WIYN images of the fields of 15 Sloan Digital Sky Survey quasars that have spectra exhibiting intervening MgII absorption-line systems with rest equivalent widths 2.7A \le REW \le 6.0A and redshifts 0.42 < z_{abs}…

Intergalactic MgII absorbers are known to have structures down to scales ~ 10^{2.5} pc, and there are now indications that they may be fragmented on scales <~ 10^{-2.5} pc (Hao et al., astro-ph/0612409). When a lensed quasar is microlensed,…

We report on a survey for strong (rest equivalent width W_r >= 1A), intervening MgII systems along the sightlines to long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). The GRB spectra which comprise the survey have a heterogeneous mix of resolution and…

GRB afterglows offer a probe of the intergalactic medium out to high redshift which complements observations along more abundant quasar lines-of-sight. Although both quasars and GRB afterglows should provide a-priori random sight-lines…

First results from a study of high ionization absorption properties in roughly 30 Mg II absorption selected galaxies are presented. We have tested for correlations of Mg II, C IV, Si IV, N V, and O VI equivalent widths with the galaxy…

We present the first results from a Hubble Space Telescope WFC3/IR program, which obtained direct imaging and grism observations of galaxies near quasar sightlines with a high frequency of uncorrelated foreground Mg II absorption. These…

The number of strong (equivalent width > 1A) MgII absorbers observed towards Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) has been found to be statistically larger than the number of strong absorbers towards quasi-stellar objects (QSOs). We formalize this "MgII…

While BL Lacertae objects are widely believed to be highly beamed, low-luminosity radio galaxies, many radio-selected BL Lacs have extended radio power levels and optical emission lines that are too luminous to be low-luminosity radio…

We revisit echelle spectra (spectral resolution R ~ 40000) of 8 Gamma-Ray Burst afterglows to obtain the incidence (dN/dz) of weak intervening Mg II systems at a mean redshift of <z> = 1.5. We show that dN/dz of systems having restframe…