The Astrophysical Journal Letters (Jan 2023)
Early Results from GLASS-JWST. XVII. Building the First Galaxies—Chapter 1. Star Formation Histories for 5 < z < 7 Galaxies
- Alan Dressler,
- Benedetta Vulcani,
- Tommaso Treu,
- Marcia Rieke,
- Chris Burns,
- Antonello Calabrò,
- Andrea Bonchi,
- Marco Castellano,
- Adriano Fontana,
- Nicha Leethochawalit,
- Charlotte Mason,
- Emiliano Merlin,
- Takahiro Morishita,
- Diego Paris,
- Marusa Bradac,
- Amata Mercurio,
- Themiya Nanayakkara,
- Bianca M. Poggianti,
- Paola Santini,
- Xin Wang,
- Karl Misselt,
- Daniel P. Stark,
- Christopher Willmer
Affiliations
- Alan Dressler
- ORCiD
- The Observatories, The Carnegie Institution for Science , 813 Santa Barbara St., Pasadena, CA 91101, USA ; [email protected]
- Benedetta Vulcani
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova , vicolo dell’Osservatorio 5, I-35122 Padova, Italy
- Tommaso Treu
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California , Los Angeles, 430 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
- Marcia Rieke
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- Chris Burns
- The Observatories, The Carnegie Institution for Science , 813 Santa Barbara St., Pasadena, CA 91101, USA ; [email protected]
- Antonello Calabrò
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Andrea Bonchi
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy; ASI-Space Science Data Center , Via del Politecnico, I-00133 Roma, Italy
- Marco Castellano
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Adriano Fontana
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Nicha Leethochawalit
- ORCiD
- School of Physics, University of Melbourne , Parkville 3010, VIC, Australia; ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions (ASTRO 3D) , Australia
- Charlotte Mason
- ORCiD
- Cosmic Dawn Center (DAWN) , Denmark; Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen , Jagtvej 128, DK-2200 Copenhagen N, Denmark
- Emiliano Merlin
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Takahiro Morishita
- ORCiD
- Infrared Processing and Analysis Center , Caltech, 1200 E. California Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Diego Paris
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Marusa Bradac
- ORCiD
- University of Ljubljana , Department of Mathematics and Physics, Jadranska ulica 19, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California Davis, 1 Shields Ave., Davis, CA 95616, USA
- Amata Mercurio
- ORCiD
- INAF–Osservatorio Astronomico di Capodimonte , Via Moiariello 16, I-80131 Napoli, Italy
- Themiya Nanayakkara
- ORCiD
- Centre for Astrophysics and Supercomputing, Swinburne University of Technology , PO Box 218, Hawthorn, VIC 3122, Australia
- Bianca M. Poggianti
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova , vicolo dell’Osservatorio 5, I-35122 Padova, Italy
- Paola Santini
- ORCiD
- INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , Via Frascati 33, I-00078 Monteporzio Catone, Rome, Italy
- Xin Wang
- ORCiD
- Infrared Processing and Analysis Center , Caltech, 1200 E. California Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Karl Misselt
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- Daniel P. Stark
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- Christopher Willmer
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ac9ebb
- Journal volume & issue
-
Vol. 947,
no. 2
p. L27
Abstract
The JWST observations of high-redshift galaxies are used to measure their star formation histories—the buildup of stellar mass in the earliest galaxies. Here we use a novel analysis program, SEDz*, to compare near-IR spectral energy distributions for galaxies with redshifts 5 < z < 7 to combinations of stellar population templates evolved from z = 12. We exploit NIRCam imaging in seven wide bands covering 1–5 μ m taken in the context of the GLASS-JWST-ERS program and use SEDz* to solve for well-constrained star formation histories for 24 exemplary galaxies. In this first look, we find a variety of histories, from long, continuous star formation over 5 < z < 12 to short but intense starbursts, sometimes repeating, and, most commonly, contiguous mass buildup lasting ∼0.5 Myr, possibly the seeds of today’s typical M * galaxies.
Keywords
