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A titanic interstellar medium ejection from a massive starburst galaxy at redshift 1.4

Puglisi, Annagrazia; Daddi, Emanuele; Brusa, Marcella; Bournaud, Frederic; Fensch, Jeremy; Liu, Daizhong; Delvecchio, Ivan; Calabrò, Antonello; Circosta, Chiara; Valentino, Francesco; Perna, Michele; Jin, Shuowen; Enia, Andrea; Mancini, Chiara; Rodighiero, Giulia

A titanic interstellar medium ejection from a massive starburst galaxy at redshift 1.4 Thumbnail


Authors

Emanuele Daddi

Marcella Brusa

Frederic Bournaud

Jeremy Fensch

Daizhong Liu

Ivan Delvecchio

Antonello Calabrò

Chiara Circosta

Francesco Valentino

Michele Perna

Shuowen Jin

Andrea Enia

Chiara Mancini

Giulia Rodighiero



Abstract

Feedback-driven winds from star formation or active galactic nuclei might be a relevant channel for the abrupt quenching of star formation in massive galaxies. However, both observations and simulations support the idea that these processes are non-conflictingly co-evolving and self-regulating. Furthermore, evidence of disruptive events that are capable of fast quenching is rare, and constraints on their statistical prevalence are lacking. Here we present a massive starburst galaxy at redshift z = 1.4, which is ejecting 46 ± 13% of its molecular gas mass at a startling rate of ≳10,000 M⊙ yr−1. A broad component that is red-shifted from the galaxy emission is detected in four (low and high J) CO and [C I] transitions and in the ionized phase, which ensures a robust estimate of the expelled gas mass. The implied statistics suggest that similar events are potentially a major star-formation quenching channel. However, our observations provide compelling evidence that this is not a feedback-driven wind, but rather material from a merger that has been probably tidally ejected. This finding challenges some literature studies in which the role of feedback-driven winds might be overstated.

Citation

Puglisi, A., Daddi, E., Brusa, M., Bournaud, F., Fensch, J., Liu, D., …Rodighiero, G. (2021). A titanic interstellar medium ejection from a massive starburst galaxy at redshift 1.4. Nature Astronomy, 5(3), 319-330. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-020-01268-x

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Nov 4, 2020
Online Publication Date Jan 11, 2021
Publication Date 2021-03
Deposit Date Jun 18, 2021
Publicly Available Date Jul 11, 2021
Journal Nature Astronomy
Publisher Nature Research
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 5
Issue 3
Pages 319-330
DOI https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-020-01268-x

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