The Astrophysical Journal (Jan 2024)
Evolution of the Size–Mass Relation of Star-forming Galaxies Since z = 5.5 Revealed by CEERS
- Ethan Ward,
- Alexander de la Vega,
- Bahram Mobasher,
- Elizabeth J. McGrath,
- Kartheik G. Iyer,
- Antonello Calabrò,
- Luca Costantin,
- Mark Dickinson,
- Benne W. Holwerda,
- Marc Huertas-Company,
- Michaela Hirschmann,
- Ray A. Lucas,
- Viraj Pandya,
- Stephen M. Wilkins,
- L. Y. Aaron Yung,
- Pablo Arrabal Haro,
- Micaela B. Bagley,
- Steven L. Finkelstein,
- Jeyhan S. Kartaltepe,
- Anton M. Koekemoer,
- Casey Papovich,
- Nor Pirzkal
Affiliations
- Ethan Ward
- Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, University of California , 900 University Ave, Riverside, CA 92521 USA
- Alexander de la Vega
- ORCiD
- Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, University of California , 900 University Ave, Riverside, CA 92521 USA
- Bahram Mobasher
- ORCiD
- Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, University of California , 900 University Ave, Riverside, CA 92521 USA
- Elizabeth J. McGrath
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Colby College , Waterville, ME 04901, USA
- Kartheik G. Iyer
- ORCiD
- Columbia Astrophysics Laboratory, Columbia University , 550 West 120th Street, New York, NY 10027, USA
- Antonello Calabrò
- ORCiD
- INAF—Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma , via di Frascati 33, 00078 Monte Porzio Catone, Italy
- Luca Costantin
- ORCiD
- Centro de Astrobiología (CAB) , CSIC-INTA, Ctra de Ajalvir km 4, Torrejón de Ardoz, 28850, Madrid, Spain
- Mark Dickinson
- ORCiD
- NSF’s National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory , 950 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
- Benne W. Holwerda
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Louisville , Louisville KY 40292, USA
- Marc Huertas-Company
- ORCiD
- Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias , La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain; Universidad de la Laguna , La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain; Université Paris-Cité , LERMA—Observatoire de Paris, PSL, Paris, France
- Michaela Hirschmann
- ORCiD
- Institute of Physics , Laboratory of Galaxy Evolution, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Observatoire de Sauverny, 1290 Versoix, Switzerland; INAF—Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste , Via G. B. Tiepolo 11, 34143 Trieste, Italy
- Ray A. Lucas
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Viraj Pandya
- ORCiD
- Columbia Astrophysics Laboratory, Columbia University , 550 West 120th Street, New York, NY 10027, USA
- Stephen M. Wilkins
- ORCiD
- Astronomy Centre, University of Sussex , Falmer, Brighton BN1 9QH, UK; Institute of Space Sciences and Astronomy, University of Malta , Msida MSD 2080, Malta
- L. Y. Aaron Yung
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Pablo Arrabal Haro
- ORCiD
- NSF’s National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory , 950 N. Cherry Ave., Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
- Micaela B. Bagley
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, The University of Texas at Austin , Austin, TX, USA
- Steven L. Finkelstein
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, The University of Texas at Austin , Austin, TX, USA
- Jeyhan S. Kartaltepe
- ORCiD
- Laboratory for Multiwavelength Astrophysics, School of Physics and Astronomy, Rochester Institute of Technology , 84 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY 14623, USA
- Anton M. Koekemoer
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Dr., Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Casey Papovich
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas A&M University , College Station, TX, 77843-4242 USA; George P. and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy, Texas A&M University , College Station, TX, 77843-4242 USA
- Nor Pirzkal
- ORCiD
- ESA/AURA Space Telescope Science Institute , USA
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ad20ed
- Journal volume & issue
-
Vol. 962,
no. 2
p. 176
Abstract
We combine deep imaging data from the CEERS early release JWST survey and Hubble Space Telescope imaging from CANDELS to examine the size–mass relation of star-forming galaxies and the morphology–quenching relation at stellar masses M _⋆ ≥ 10 ^9.5 M _⊙ over the redshift range 0.5 < z < 5.5. In this study with a sample of 2450 galaxies, we separate star-forming and quiescent galaxies based on their star formation activity and confirm that star-forming and quiescent galaxies have different morphologies out to z = 5.5, extending the results of earlier studies out to higher redshifts. We find that star-forming and quiescent galaxies have typical Sérsic indices of n ∼ 1.3 and n ∼ 4.3, respectively. Focusing on star-forming galaxies, we find that the slope of the size–mass relation is nearly constant with redshift, as was found previously, but shows a modest increase at z ∼ 4.2. The intercept in the size–mass relation declines out to z = 5.5 at rates that are similar to what earlier studies found. The intrinsic scatter in the size–mass relation is relatively constant out to z = 5.5.
Keywords
