Related papers: Gaseous Galactic Halos and QSO Absorption Line Sys…
We investigate the relative distribution of the gaseous contents of the Universe (as traced by a sample of Lyman alpha (lya) absorbers), and the luminous baryonic matter (as traced by a redshift survey of galaxies in the same volume…
Major flows of ionized gas are thought to be present in the nuclei of most luminous QSOs, and absorption by these flows often has a significant effect upon the observed X-ray continuum from the black hole region. We briefly discuss X-ray…
We report on the detection of a population of weak metal-line absorbers in the halo or nearby intergalactic environment of the Milky Way. Using high-resolution ultraviolet absorption-line spectra of bright QSOs obtained with the Space…
Not the way one might have thought. In hydrodynamic simulations of galaxy formation, some gas follows the traditionally envisioned route, shock heating to the halo virial temperature before cooling to the much lower temperature of the…
We investigate the properties of the circumgalactic gas in the halo of quasar host galaxies from CIV absorption line systems. Optical spectroscopy of closely aligned pairs of quasars (projected distance \leq 200 kpc) obtained at the Gran…
Older and more recent pieces of observational evidence suggest a strong connection between QSOs and galaxies; in particular, the recently discovered correlation between black hole and galactic bulge masses suggests that QSO activity is…
Absorption signatures in the spectra of QSOs are one of our most powerful tools for studying galactic and intergalactic environments at high redshifts. With the discovery of QSOs out to z > 7, QSO absorption lines are now tracing the end…
The Galactic halo has a complex assembly history, which can be seen in its wealth of kinematic and chemical substructure. Globular clusters lose stars through tidal interactions with the Galaxy and cluster evaporation processes, meaning…
We present results from an ongoing search for galaxy counterparts of a subgroup of Quasar Absorption Line Systems called Damped Ly-alpha Absorbers (DLAs). DLAs have several characteristics that make them essential in the process of…
It is currently believed that galaxies were assembled via chaotic hierarchical mergers between massive cold dark matter halos, in which baryonic star forming matter was embedded. One would therefore expect the properties of individual…
Continued star formation over the lifetime of a galaxy suggests that low metalicity gas is steadily flowing in from the circumgalactic medium. Also, cosmological simulations of large-scale structure formation imply that gas is accreted onto…
We present the results of a numerical code that combines multi-zone chemical evolution with 1-D hydrodynamics to follow in detail the evolution and radial behaviour of gas and stars during the formation of elliptical galaxies. We use the…
We have obtained new observations of the absorption system at $z_\mathrm{abs}=0.48$ toward QSO Q0454-220, which we use to constrain its chemical and physical conditions. The system features metal-enriched gas and previously unknown…
The genesis of spheroids is central to our understanding of galaxy formation -- they are relatively simple systems, containing about half the stellar mass of the Universe. A major subset of spheroids, massive elliptical galaxies, are…
We have obtained optical spectra of four galaxies associated with MgII QSO absorbers at redshifts 0.10 < z < 0.45. We calculate the gas-phase oxygen abundance of these galaxies using the empirical R23 strong line method. The absolute B-band…
This paper provides a general reference for deriving the ionizations and metal abundances for absorption-line clouds in photoionization equilibrium with a QSO spectrum. The results include a quantitative assessment of the theoretical…
In contradiction to the simple AGN unification schemes, there exists a significant population of broad line, z~2 QSOs which have heavily absorbed X-ray spectra. These objects have luminosities and redshifts characteristic of the sources…
We present details regarding the construction of a composite spectrum of quasar (QSO) absorption line systems. In this composite spectrum we identify more than 70 absorption lines, and observe oxygen and hydrogen emission features at a…
We present new GHRS observations of Lyman alpha absorption lines associated with a group of galaxies towards the QSO 1545+2101. We have identified eight distinct Lyman alpha absorption features in the spectrum of QSO 1545+2101 at a mean…
Using the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) the COS Science Team has conducted a high signal-to-noise survey of 14 bright QSOs. In a previous paper (Savage et al. 2014) these far-UV spectra were used to…