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Kiloparsec-scale Dust Disks in High-redshift Luminous Submillimeter Galaxies

Hodge, J.A.; Swinbank, A.M.; Simpson, J.M.; Smail, I.; Walter, F.; Alexander, D.M.; Bertoldi, F.; Biggs, A.D.; Brandt, W.N.; Chapman, S.C.; Chen, C.C.; Coppin, K.E.K.; Cox, P.; Dannerbauer, H.; Edge, A.C.; Greve, T.R.; Ivison, R.J.; Karim, A.; Knudsen, K.K.; Menten, K.M.; Rix, H.-W.; Schinnerer, E.; Wardlow, J.L.; Weiss, A.; van der Werf, P.

Kiloparsec-scale Dust Disks in High-redshift Luminous Submillimeter Galaxies Thumbnail


Authors

J.A. Hodge

J.M. Simpson

F. Walter

F. Bertoldi

A.D. Biggs

W.N. Brandt

S.C. Chapman

C.C. Chen

K.E.K. Coppin

P. Cox

H. Dannerbauer

T.R. Greve

R.J. Ivison

A. Karim

K.K. Knudsen

K.M. Menten

H.-W. Rix

E. Schinnerer

J.L. Wardlow

A. Weiss

P. van der Werf



Abstract

We present high-resolution (0farcs16) 870 μm Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) imaging of 16 luminous (${L}_{\mathrm{IR}}\sim 4\times {10}^{12}\,{L}_{\odot }$) submillimeter galaxies (SMGs) from the ALESS survey of the Extended Chandra Deep Field South. This dust imaging traces the dust-obscured star formation in these $z\sim 2.5$ galaxies on ~1.3 kpc scales. The emission has a median effective radius of R e = 0farcs24 ± 0farcs02, corresponding to a typical physical size of ${R}_{e}=$ 1.8 ± 0.2 kpc. We derive a median Sérsic index of n = 0.9 ± 0.2, implying that the dust emission is remarkably disk-like at the current resolution and sensitivity. We use different weighting schemes with the visibilities to search for clumps on 0farcs12 (~1.0 kpc) scales, but we find no significant evidence for clumping in the majority of cases. Indeed, we demonstrate using simulations that the observed morphologies are generally consistent with smooth exponential disks, suggesting that caution should be exercised when identifying candidate clumps in even moderate signal-to-noise ratio interferometric data. We compare our maps to comparable-resolution Hubble Space Telescope ${H}_{160}$-band images, finding that the stellar morphologies appear significantly more extended and disturbed, and suggesting that major mergers may be responsible for driving the formation of the compact dust disks we observe. The stark contrast between the obscured and unobscured morphologies may also have implications for SED fitting routines that assume the dust is co-located with the optical/near-IR continuum emission. Finally, we discuss the potential of the current bursts of star formation to transform the observed galaxy sizes and light profiles, showing that the $z\sim 0$ descendants of these SMGs are expected to have stellar masses, effective radii, and gas surface densities consistent with the most compact massive (${M}_{* }\,\sim $ 1–2 × 1011 ${M}_{\odot }$) early-type galaxies observed locally.

Citation

Hodge, J., Swinbank, A., Simpson, J., Smail, I., Walter, F., Alexander, D., …van der Werf, P. (2016). Kiloparsec-scale Dust Disks in High-redshift Luminous Submillimeter Galaxies. Astrophysical Journal, 833(1), Article 103. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/833/1/103

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Oct 9, 2016
Online Publication Date Dec 9, 2016
Publication Date Dec 9, 2016
Deposit Date Feb 22, 2017
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Astrophysical Journal
Print ISSN 0004-637X
Electronic ISSN 1538-4357
Publisher American Astronomical Society
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 833
Issue 1
Article Number 103
DOI https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/833/1/103
Related Public URLs http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016ApJ...833..103H

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Copyright Statement
© 2016. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.





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