(Abridged) We present an imaging and spectroscopic survey of galaxies in fields around QSOs HE0226-4110, PKS0405-123, and PG1216+069. The fields are selected to have ultraviolet echelle spectra available, which uncover 195 Lya absorbers and 13 OVI absorbers along the three sightlines. We obtain robust redshifts for 1104 galaxies of rest-frame absolute magnitude M_R-5log h <~ -16 and at projected physical distances rho <~ 4 h^{-1} Mpc from the QSOs. HST/WFPC2 images of the fields around PKS0405-123 and PG1216+069 are available for studying the optical morphologies of absorbing galaxies. Combining the absorber and galaxy data, we perform a cross-correlation study to understand the physical origin of Lya and OVI absorbers and to constrain the properties of extended gas around galaxies. The results of our study are (1) both strong Lya absorbers of log N(HI) >= 14 and OVI absorbers exhibit a comparable clustering amplitude as emission-line dominated galaxies and a factor of ~ 6 weaker amplitude than absorption-line dominated galaxies on co-moving projected distance scales of r_p < 3 h^{-1} Mpc; (2) weak Lya absorbers of log N(HI)<13.5 appear to cluster very weakly around galaxies; (3) none of the absorption-line dominated galaxies at r_p <= 250 h^{-1} kpc has a corresponding OVI absorber to a sensitive upper limit of W(1031) < 0.03 A, while the covering fraction of OVI absorbing gas around emission-line dominated galaxies is found to be kappa ~ 64%; and (4) high-resolution images of five OVI absorbing galaxies show that these galaxies exhibit disk-like morphologies with mildly disturbed features on the edge.
The distribution of the absorption line broadening observed in the Ly$α$ forest carries information about the temperature and widths of the filaments in the intergalactic medium (IGM). In this work, we present and test a new method for inferring the temperature of the IGM, the size of the absorbing filaments and the photo-ionization rate of hydrogen from the properties of absorption line broadening in the Ly$α$ forest. We apply our method to mock spectra from the reference model of the EAGLE cosmological simulation, and we demonstrate that we are able to reconstruct the IGM properties. Our met…
In order to investigate the origin of the excess of strong MgII systems towards GRB afterglows as compared to QSO sightlines, we have measured the incidence of MgII absorbers towards a third class of objects: the Blazars. This class includes the BL Lac object population for which a tentative excess of MgII systems had already been reported. We observed with FORS1 at the ESO-VLT 42 Blazars with an emission redshift 0.8<z_em<1.9, to which we added the three high z northern objects belonging to the 1Jy BL Lac sample. We detect 32 MgII absorbers in the redshift range 0.35-1.45, leading to an exces…
Recent detailed studies of Narrow Absorption Line (NAL) systems in QSO-spectra have revealed that at least 50% of QSOs have NALs associated with the central engine, and in most cases they are found to be outflowing. Will studies of NALs provide the much sort after evidence for ubiquitous QSO feedback that can halt the formation of stars in galaxies? I present new results on the distribution of line-of-sight velocity offsets between MgII absorbers and their background QSOs, based on a large catalogue of absorbers from SDSS DR6 and greatly improved QSO-redshift estimates. My analysis reveals a h…
This paper investigates the effect of differential aperture loss with SDSS fibers and examines whether such selection bias would result in the observed correlation between rest-frame absorption equivalent width of MgII absorbers, Wr(2796), and mean associated [OII] luminosity, L_[OII], in SDSS QSO spectra. We demonstrate based on a Monte Carlo simulation that the observed Wr(2796) vs. L_[OII] correlation of MgII absorbers can be well-reproduced, if all galaxies found in deep surveys possess extended MgII halos and if the extent of MgII halos scales proportionally with galaxy mass as shown in p…
QSO near-zones are an important probe of the the ionization state of the IGM at z ~ 6-7, at the end of reionization. We present here high-resolution cosmological 3D radiative transfer simulations of QSO environments for a wide range of host halo masses, 10$^{10-12.5}$ M_sun. Our simulated near-zones reproduce both the overall decrease of observed near-zone sizes at 6 < z < 7 and their scatter. The observable near-zone properties in our simulations depend only very weakly on the mass of the host halo. The size of the H II region expanding into the IGM is generally limited by (super-)Lyman Limit…
We continue our series of papers on intergalactic medium (IGM) tracers using quasi-stellar objects (QSOs), having examined gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and blazars in earlier studies. We have estimated the IGM properties of hydrogen column density (Nhxigm), temperature and metallicity using XMM-Newton QSO spectra over a large redshift range, with a collisional ionisation equilibrium (CIE) model for the ionised plasma. The Nhxigm parameter results were robust with respect to intrinsic power laws, spectral counts, reflection hump and soft excess features. There is scope for a luminosity bias given bo…
We present models of low- and high-ionization metal-line absorbers (O I, C II, C IV and Mg II) during the end of the reionization epoch, at z ~ 6. Using four cosmological hydrodynamical simulations with different feedback schemes (including the Illustris and Sherwood simulations) and two different choices of hydro-solver, we investigate how the overall incidence rate and equivalent width distribution of metal-line absorbers varies with the galactic wind prescription. We find that the O I and C II absorbers are reasonably insensitive to the feedback scheme. All models, however, struggle to repr…
We present new high-precision measurements of the opacity of the intergalactic and circumgalactic medium (IGM, CGM) at <z>=2.4. Using Voigt profile fits to the full Lyman alpha and Lyman beta forests in 15 high-resolution high-S/N spectra of hyperluminous QSOs, we make the first statistically robust measurement of the frequency of absorbers with HI column densities 14 < log(NHI) < 17.2. We also present the first measurements of the frequency distribution of HI absorbers in the volume surrounding high-z galaxies (the CGM, 300 pkpc), finding that the incidence of absorbers in the CGM is much hig…
We present new absorption-line analysis and new galaxy survey data obtained for the field around PKS0405-123 at z=0.57. Combining previously known OVI absorbers with new identifications in the higher S/N UV spectra obtained with COS, we have established a sample of 7 OVI absorbers and 12 individual components at z=0.0918-0.495 along the sightline toward PKS0405-123. We complement the available UV absorption spectra with galaxy survey data that reach 100% completeness at projected distances rho<200 kpc of the quasar sightline for galaxies as faint as 0.1L* (0.2L*) out to redshifts of z=0.35 (z=…
We use high-quality, medium-resolution {\it Hubble Space Telescope}/Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (\HST/COS) observations of 82 UV-bright AGN at redshifts $z_{AGN}<0.85$ to construct the largest survey of the low-redshift intergalactic medium (IGM) to date: 5343 individual extragalactic absorption lines in HI and 25 different metal-ion species grouped into 2610 distinct redshift systems at $z_{abs}<0.75$ covering total redshift pathlengths $Δz_{HI}=21.7$ and $Δz_{OVI}=14.5$. Our semi-automated line-finding and measurement technique renders the catalog as objectively-defined as possible. The cumu…
There exists a significant population of broad line, z~2 QSOs which have heavily absorbed X-ray spectra. Follow up observations in the submillimetre show that these QSOs are embedded in ultraluminous starburst galaxies, unlike most unabsorbed QSOs at the same redshifts and luminosities. Here we present X-ray spectra from XMM-Newton for a sample of 5 such X-ray absorbed QSOs that have been detected at submillimetre wavelengths. We also present spectra in the restframe ultraviolet from ground based telescopes. All 5 QSOs are found to exhibit strong C IV absorption lines in their ultraviolet spec…
At low densities the standard ionisation history of the intergalactic medium (IGM) predicts a decreasing temperature of the IGM with decreasing density once hydrogen (and helium) reionisation is complete. Heating the high-redshift, low-density IGM above the temperature expected from photo-heating is difficult, and previous claims of high/rising temperatures in low density regions of the Universe based on the probability density function (PDF) of the opacity in Lyman-$α$ forest data at $2<z<4$ have been met with considerable scepticism, particularly since they appear to be in tension with other…
The first systematic study of the warm gas (T=10^4-5 K) distribution across a galaxy cluster is presented using multiple background QSOs to the Virgo Cluster. We detect 25 Lya absorbers (N_HI = 10^13.1-15.4 cm^-2) in the Virgo velocity range toward 9 of 12 QSO sightlines observed with Cosmic Origin Spectrograph, with a cluster impact parameter range of 0.36-1.65 Mpc (0.23-1.05R_vir). Including 18 Lya absorbers previously detected by STIS or GHRS toward 7 of 11 background QSOs in and around the Virgo Cluster, we establish a sample of 43 absorbers towards a total of 23 background probes for stud…
(Abridged) We present a sample of new population of associated absorbers, detected through Ne VIII λλ770,780 absorption, in HST/COS spectra of intermediate redshift (0.45 < z < 1.21) quasars (QSOs). Our sample comprised of total 12 associated Ne VIII systems detected towards 8 lines of sight (none of them are radio bright). The incidence rate of these absorbers is found to be 40%. Majority of the Ne VIII systems at small ejection velocities (v_ej) show complete coverage of the background source, but systems with higher v_ej show lower covering fractions (i.e. f_c < 0.8) and systematically high…
Composite spectra of 85 proximate absorbers (log N(HI)>20 and velocity difference between the absorption and emission redshift, dv<10,000 km/s) in the SDSS are used to investigate the trends of metal line strengths with velocity separation from the QSO. We construct composites in 3 velocity bins: dv<3000 km/s, 3000<dv<6000 km/s and dv>6000 km/s, with further sub-samples to investigate the metal line dependence on N(HI) and QSO luminosity. Low (e.g. SiII and FeII) and high ionization (e.g. SiIV and CIV) species alike have equivalent widths (EWs) that are larger by factors of 1.5 -- 3 in the dv<…
We present a detailed analysis of the ionization and thermal structure of the intergalactic medium (IGM) around a high-redshift QSO using a large suite of cosmological, multi-frequency radiative transfer (RT) simulations, exploring the contribution from galaxies as well as the QSO, and the effect of X-rays and secondary ionization. We show that in high-z QSO environments both the central QSO and the surrounding galaxies concertedly control the reionization morphology of hydrogen and helium and have a non-linear impact on the thermal structure of the IGM. A QSO imprints a distinctive morphology…
Using hydrodynamic simulations we compute the metal enrichment history of the intergalactic medium (IGM). We show that galactic superwind (GSW) feedback can transport metals to the IGM and that the properties of simulated metal absorbers match observations. The distance of influence of GSW is typically limited to >0.5Mpc and within regions of overdensity >10. Most CIV and OVI absorbers are located within shocked regions of elevated temperature (T>2x10^4K), overdensity (>10), and metallicity ([-2.5,-0.5]). OVI absorbers have typically higher metallicity, lower density and higher temperature tha…
A late end to reionisation at redshift $z\simeq 5.3$ is consistent with observed spatial variations in the Ly$α$ forest transmission and the deficit of Ly$α$ emitting galaxies around extended Ly$α$ absorption troughs at $z=5.5$. In this model, large islands of neutral hydrogen should persist in the diffuse intergalactic medium (IGM) until $z\simeq 6$. We use a novel, hybrid approach that combines high resolution cosmological hydrodynamical simulations with radiative transfer to predict the incidence of strong 21 cm forest absorbers with optical depths $τ_{21}>10^{-2}$ from the diffuse IGM in t…
We introduce a new method for determining the influence of galaxies and active galactic nuclei (AGN) on the physical state of the intergalactic medium (IGM) at high redshift and illustrate its potential via a first application to the field of the $z=6.42$ QSO J1148+5251. By correlating the spatial positions of spectroscopically-confirmed Lyman break galaxies (LBGs) with fluctuations in the Lyman alpha forest seen in the high signal-to-noise spectrum of a background QSO, we provide a statistical measure of the typical escape fraction of Lyman continuum photons close to the end of cosmic reionis…
The detection of an unexpectedly large number of faint candidate quasars (QSO) at $z \gtrsim 4$ has motivated Madau and Haardt to investigate a reionization scenario in which active galactic nuclei dominate the photon budget at all times. Their analytical study reveals that this picture is in agreement with the evolution of the HI volume fraction in the intergalactic medium (IGM) and the optical depth to Thomson scattering of the cosmic microwave background. We employ a suite of hydrodynamical simulations post-processed with a radiative transfer code to further investigate the properties of su…
The spectrum of cosmic ultraviolet background radiation at He II ionizing energies (E > 4 Ryd) is important to study the He II reionization, thermal history of the intergalactic medium (IGM) and metal lines observed in QSO absorption spectra. It is determined by the emissivity of QSOs at E > 4 Ryd obtained from their observed luminosity functions and the mean spectral energy distribution (SED). The SED is approximated as a power-law at energies E > 1 Ryd, $f_E \propto E^α$, where the existing observations constrain the power-law index $α$ only up to ~2.3 Ryd. Here, we constrain $α$ for E > 4 R…
We present a new method for determining the thermal state of the intergalactic medium based on Voigt profile decomposition of the Ly$α$ forest. The distribution of Doppler parameter and column density ($b$-$N_{\text{HI}}$ distribution) is sensitive to the temperature density relation $T=T_0 (ρ/ρ_0)^{γ-1}$, and previous work has inferred $T_0$ and $γ$ by fitting its low-$b$ cutoff. This approach discards the majority of available data, and is susceptible to systematics related to cutoff determination. We present a method that exploits all information encoded in the $b$-$N_{\text{HI}}$ distribut…
Among the key parameters defining the ISM of galaxies is the fraction of the metals that are locked up in dust: the metals-to-dust ratio. This ratio bears not only on the ISM and its evolution, but particularly on the origin of cosmic dust. We combine extinction and abundance data from GRB afterglows, from QSO absorbers, as well as from galaxy-lensed QSOs, to determine the metals-to-dust ratios for lines-of-sight through a wide diversity of galaxies from blue, dwarf starbursts to massive ellipticals, across a vast range in redshift z=0.1-6.3, and nearly three orders of magnitude in column dens…
We present results from the Keck Baryonic Structure Survey (KBSS), a unique spectroscopic survey designed to explore the connection between galaxies and intergalactic baryons. The KBSS is optimized for the redshift range z ~ 2-3, combining S/N ~ 100 Keck/HIRES spectra of 15 hyperluminous QSOs with densely sampled galaxy redshift surveys surrounding each QSO sightline. We perform Voigt profile decomposition of all 6000 HI absorbers within the full Lya forest in the QSO spectra. Here we present the distribution, column density, kinematics, and absorber line widths of HI surrounding 886 star-form…
Because of their cosmological origin, gamma-ray burst (GRB) optical afterglows are attenuated when they pass intergalactic absorbers in the GRB line-of-sight. Without the knowledge of the number of absorbers and their physical properties, the effect of absorption on the observed magnitudes can not be determined precisely. Different methods have been applied in order to correct for this effect statistically, either using semi-analytical calculations or numerical simulations. We follow these works and present the expected magnitude corrections as a function of redshift for a set of filters most …
Motivated by the anomalous dust-to-metal ratios derived in the literature for gamma-ray burst (GRB) damped Lyman-alpha absorbers (DLAs), we measure these ratios using the dust-depletion pattern observed in UV/optical afterglow spectra associated with the ISM at the GRB host-galaxy redshifts. Our sample consists of 20 GRB absorbers and a comparison sample of 72 QSO-DLAs with redshift 1.2 < z < 4.0 and down to Z = 0.002 Z_Sol metallicities. The dust-to-metal ratio in QSO- and GRB-DLAs increases both with metallicity and metal column density, spanning ~10--110% of the Galactic value and pointing …
We report the discovery of a "super-damped" Lyman-alpha absorber at $z_{abs}=2.2068$ toward QSO Q1135-0010 in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and follow-up VLT UVES spectroscopy. Voigt profile fit to the DLA line indicates log $N_{\rm H I} = 22.05 \pm 0.1$. This is the second QSO DLA discovered to date with such high $N_{\rm H I}$. We derive element abundances [Si/H] = $-1.10 \pm 0.10$, [Zn/H] = $-1.06 \pm 0.10$, [Cr/H] = $-1.55 \pm 0.10$, [Ni/H] = $-1.60 \pm 0.10$, [Fe/H] = $-1.76 \pm 0.10$, [Ti/H] = $-1.69 \pm 0.11$, [P/H] = $-0.93 \pm 0.23$, and [Cu/H] = $-0.75 \pm 0.14$. Our data indicate de…
We have studied a sample of 1084 intervening absorption systems with 2.15$\le z_{ab}\le$5.2, having log(N$_{\rm HI}$) $>$ 20.0 in the spectra of QSOs in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data release 7 (DR7), with the aim of understanding the nature and abundance of the dust and the chemical abundances in the DLA absorbers. Composite spectra were constructed for the full sample and several subsamples, chosen on the basis of absorber and QSO properties. Average extinction curves were obtained for the samples by comparing their geometric mean composite spectra with those of two samples of QSOs, ma…
IGM metal absorption lines observed in z>6 spectra offer the opportunity to probe early feedback processes, the nature of enriching sources, and the topology of reionization. We run high-resolution cosmological simulations including galactic outflows to study the observability and physical properties of 5 ions (C II, C IV, O I, Si II, Si IV) in absorption between z=8->5. We apply three cases for ionization conditions: Fully neutral, fully reionized, and a patchy model based on the flux from the nearest galaxy. We find that our simulations broadly fit available z~5-6 IGM metal-line data, althou…
Using Voigt-profile-fitting procedures on Keck HIRES spectra of nine QSOs we identify 1099 CIV absorber components clumped in 201 systems outside the Lyman forest over 1.6 < z < 4.4. With associated SiIV, CII, SiII and NV where available we investigate bulk statistical and ionization properties of the components and systems and find no significant change in redshift for CIV and SiIV while CII, SiII and NV change substantially. The CIV components exhibit strong clustering but no clustering is detected for systems on scales from 150 km/s out to 50000 km/s. We conclude the clustering is due entir…
We report results from a survey of MgII absorbers in the spectra of background QSOs that are within close angular distances to a foreground galaxy at z<0.5, using the Magellan Echellette Spectrograph. We have established a spectroscopic sample of 94 galaxies at a median redshift of <z> = 0.24 in fields around 70 distant background QSOs (z_QSO>0.6), 71 of which are in an 'isolated' environment with no known companions and located at rho <~ 120 h^-1 kpc from the line of sight of a background QSO. The rest-frame absolute B-band magnitudes span a range from M_B-5log h=-16.4 to M_B-5log h=-21.4 and…
We present a catalogue of MgII absorption systems obtained from high resolution UVES/VLT data of 77 QSOs in the redshift range 0.6 < z < 2.0, and down to an equivalent width W_0 > 0.1 Å. The statistical properties of our sample are found to be in agreement with those from previous work in the literature. However, we point out that the previously observed increase with redshift of dN/dz for weak absorbers, pertains exclusively to very weak absorbers with W_0 < 0.1 Å. Instead, dN/dz for absorbers with W_0 in the range 0.1-0.3 Åactually decreases with redshift, similarly to the case of strong abs…
We present new GALEX images and optical spectroscopy of J1229+02, a dwarf post-starburst galaxy located 81 kpc from the 1585 km/s absorber in the 3C 273 sight line. The absence of Hα emission and the faint GALEX UV fluxes confirm that the galaxy's recent star formation rate is $<10^{-3} M_{\odot}$/yr. Absorption-line strengths and the UV-optical SED give similar estimates of the acceptable model parameters for its youngest stellar population where $f_m$ < 60% of its total stars (by mass) formed in a burst $t_sb$ = 0.7-3.4 Gyr ago with a stellar metallicity of -1.7 < [Fe/H] < +0.2; we also esti…
In the near future, measurements of metal absorption features in the intergalactic medium (IGM) will become an important constraint on models of the formation and evolution of the earliest galaxies, the properties of the first stars, and the reionization and enrichment of the IGM. The first measurement of a metal abundance in the IGM at a redshift approaching the epoch of reionization already offers intriguing hints. Between z=5.8 and 4.7 (a 0.3 Gyr interval only 1 Gyr after the big bang), the measured density of CIV absorbers in the IGM increased by a factor of ~ 3.5 (Ryan-Weber et al. 2009; …
We present a comprehensive catalog of ultraviolet HST/STIS and FUSE absorbers in the low-redshift IGM at z<0.4. The catalog draws from the extensive literature on IGM absorption, and it reconciles discrepancies among previous catalogs through a critical evaluation of all reported absorption features in light of new HST/COS data. We report on 746 HI absorbers down to a rest-frame equivalent width of 12 milliAngstroms over a maximum redshift path length Deltaz=5.38. We also confirm 111 OVI absorbers, 29 CIV absorbers, and numerous absorption features due to other metal ions. We characterize the …
We investigate the metallicity evolution and content of the intergalactic medium (IGM) and galactic halo gas from z=2->0 using 110-million particle cosmological hydrodynamic simulations. We focus on the detectability and physical properties of UV resonance metal-line absorbers observable with Hubble's Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS). We confirm that galactic superwind outflows are required to enrich the IGM to observed levels down to z=0 using three wind prescriptions contrasted to a no-wind simulation. Our favoured momentum-conserved wind prescription deposits metals closer to galaxies owin…
We present the results of a survey for damped (DLA, log N(H I) > 20.3) and sub-damped Lyman-? systems (19.5 < log N(H I) < 20.3) at z > 2.55 along the lines-of-sight to 77 quasars with emission redshifts in the range 4 < zem < 6.3. Intermediate resolution (R ? 4300) spectra have been obtained with the Echellette Spectrograph and Imager (ESI) mounted on the Keck telescope. A total of 100 systems with log N(H I) > 19.5 are detected of which 40 systems are damped Lyman-? systems for an absorption length of ?X = 378. About half of the lines of sight of this homogeneous survey have never been inves…
The intergalactic medium (IGM) is the dominant reservoir of baryons at all cosmic epochs. We investigate the evolution of the IGM from z=2-0 in 48 Mpc/h, 110-million particle cosmological hydrodynamic simulations using three prescriptions for galactic outflows. We focus on the evolution of IGM physical properties, and how such properties are traced by Ly-alpha absorption as detectable using HST/COS. Our results broadly confirm the canonical picture that most Ly-alpha absorbers arise from highly ionized gas tracing filamentary large-scale structure. Growth of structure causes gas to move from t…
Because the same massive stars that reionized the intergalactic medium (IGM) inevitably exploded as supernovae that polluted the Universe with metals, the history of cosmic reionization and enrichment are intimately intertwined. While the overly sensitive Ly-alpha transition completely saturates in a neutral IGM, strong low-ionization metal lines like the MgII 2796,2804 doublet will give rise to a detectable `metal-line forest' if the metals produced during reionization (Z ~ 10^{-3}Z_sol) permeate the neutral IGM. We simulate the MgII forest for the first time by combining a large hydrodynamic…
(arXiv abridged abstract) The observed UV rest-frame spectra of distant galaxies are the result of their intrinsic emission combined with absorption along the line of sight produced by the inter-galactic medium (IGM). Here we analyse the evolution of the mean IGM transmission Tr(Ly_alpha) and its dispersion along the line of sight for 2127 galaxies with 2.5<z<5.5 in the VIMOS Ultra Deep Survey (VUDS). We fit model spectra combined with a range of IGM transmission to the galaxy spectra using the spectral fitting algorithm GOSSIP+. We use these fits to derive the mean IGM transmission towards ea…
Q0151+048 is a physical QSO pair at z ~ 1.929 with a separation of 3.3 arcsec on the sky. In the spectrum of Q0151+048A (qA), a DLA is observed at a higher redshift. We have previously detected the host galaxies of both QSOs, as well as a Lya blob. We performed low-resolution spectroscopy with the slit aligned with the extended emission. We also observed the system using the medium-resolution VLT/X-shooter spectrograph and the slit aligned with the two QSOs. We measure systemic redshifts of zem(A)=1.92924{\pm}0.00036 and zem(B)=1.92863{\pm}0.00042 from the Hβ and Hα emission lines, respectivel…
The hyperfine transition of $^3$He$^+$ at 3.5cm has been thought as a probe of the high-z IGM since it offers a unique insight into the evolution of the helium component of the gas, as well as potentially give an independent constraint on the 21cm signal from neutral hydrogen. In this paper, we use radiative transfer simulations of reionization driven by sources such as stars, X-ray binaries, accreting black holes and shock heated interstellar medium, and simulations of a high-z quasar to characterize the signal and analyze its prospects of detection. We find that the peak of the signal lies i…
We present redshift space two-point ($ξ$), three-point ($ζ$) and reduced three-point (Q) correlations of Ly$α$ absorbers (Voigt profile components having HI column density, $N_{\rm HI}>10^{13.5}$cm$^{-2}$) over three redshift bins spanning $1.7< z<3.5$ using high-resolution spectra of 292 quasars. We detect positive $ξ$ up to 8 $h^{-1}$ cMpc in all three redshift bins. The strongest detection of $ζ=1.81\pm 0.59$ (with Q$=0.68\pm 0.23$), is in $z=1.7-2.3$ bin at $1-2h^{-1}$ cMpc. The measured $ξ$ and $ζ$ values show an increasing trend with $N_{\rm HI}$, while Q remains relatively independent o…
We develop an automated technique for detecting damped Lyman-$α$ absorbers (DLAs) along spectroscopic lines of sight to quasi-stellar objects (QSOs or quasars). The detection of DLAs in large-scale spectroscopic surveys such as SDSS-III sheds light on galaxy formation at high redshift, showing the nucleation of galaxies from diffuse gas. We use nearly 50 000 QSO spectra to learn a novel tailored Gaussian process model for quasar emission spectra, which we apply to the DLA detection problem via Bayesian model selection. We propose models for identifying an arbitrary number of DLAs along a given…
Quasi-stellar objects (QSOs) whose spectral energy distributions (SEDs) are reddened by dust either in their host galaxies or in intervening absorber galaxies are to a large degree missed by optical color selection criteria like the one used by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). To overcome this bias against red QSOs, we employ a combined optical and near-infrared color selection. In this paper, we present a spectroscopic follow-up campaign of a sample of red candidate QSOs which were selected from the SDSS and the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey (UKIDSS). The spectroscopic data and SDSS/UKID…
We present a new perturbative approach to "constrained Ly$α$ radiative transfer'" (RT) through the circum- and inter-galactic medium (CGM and IGM). We constrain the HI content and kinematics of the CGM and IGM in a physically motivated model, using the galaxy-Ly$α$ forest clustering data from spectroscopic galaxy surveys in QSO fields at $z\sim2-3$. This enables us to quantify the impact of the CGM/IGM on Ly$α$ emission in an observationally constrained, realistic cosmological environment. Our model predicts that the CGM and IGM at these redshifts transmit $\approx80~\%$ of Ly$α$ photons after…
We present the KODIAQ-Z survey aimed to characterize the cool, photoionized gas at 2.2<z<3.6 in 202 HI-selected absorbers with 14.6<log N(HI)<20, i.e., the gaseous interface between galaxies and the intergalactic medium (IGM). We find that the 14.6<log N(HI)<20 gas at 2.2<z<3.6 can be metal-rich gas (-1.6<[X/H]<-0.2) as seen in damped Ly-alpha absorbers (DLAs); it can also be very metal-poor ([X/H]<-2.4) or even pristine gas ([X/H]<-3.8) not observed in DLAs, but commonly observed in the IGM. For 16<log N(HI)<20 absorbers, the frequency of pristine absorbers is about 1%-10%, while for 14.6<log…
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 stages of reionization on multiple fronts using the hydrogen Lyman-$α$ forest and heavy element absorbers. Next-generation QSO absorption line studies with large optical/IR telescopes will reveal in detail how the first galaxies emerged form the cosmic web, transformed their circum- and inter-galactic environments, and completed the last major phase transition…
The intergalactic medium (IGM) is believed to contain the majority of baryons in the universe and to trace the same dark matter structure as galaxies, forming filaments and sheets. Lya absorbers, which sample the neutral component of the IGM, have been extensively studied at low and high redshift, but the exact relation between Lya absorption, galaxies and the large-scale structure is observationally not well-constrained. In this study, we aim at characterising the relation between Lya absorbers and nearby overdense cosmological structures (galaxy filaments) at recession velocities Delta v \le…
We use archival UV absorption-line data from HST/STIS to statistically analyse the absorption characteristics of the high-velocity clouds (HVCs) in the Galactic halo towards more than 40 extragalactic background sources. We determine absorption covering fractions of low- and intermediate ions (OI, CII, SiIII, MgII, FeII, SiIII, CIV, and SiIV) in the range fc = 0.20 - 0.70. For detailed analysis we concentrate on SiII absorption components in HVCs, for which we investigate the distribution of column densities, b-values, and radial velocities. Combining information for SiII and MgII, and using a…
JWST ASPIRE: How Did Galaxies Complete Reionization? Evidence for Excess IGM Transmission around ${\rm [O\,{\scriptstyle III}]}$ Emitters during Reionization
We analyse the properties of MgII absorption systems detected along the sightlines toward GRBs using a sample of 10 GRB afterglow spectra obtained with VLT-UVES over the past six years. The S/N ratio is sufficiently high that we can extend previous studies to smaller equivalent widths (typically Wr>0.3A). Over a pathlength of Delta(z)~14 the number of weak absorbers detected is similar along GRB and QSO lines of sight, while the number of strong systems is larger along GRB lines of sight with a 2-sigma significance. Using intermediate and low resolution observations reported in the literature,…
Visualizing the high-redshift Universe is difficult due to the dearth of available data; however, the Lyman-alpha forest provides a means to map the intergalactic medium at redshifts not accessible to large galaxy surveys. Large-scale structure surveys, such as the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS), have collected quasar (QSO) spectra that enable the reconstruction of HI density fluctuations. The data fall on a collection of lines defined by the lines-of-sight (LOS) of the QSO, and a major issue with producing a 3D reconstruction is determining how to model the regions between the…
