Deep optical spectroscopic surveys of galaxies provide us a unique opportunity to investigate rest-frame ultra-violet (UV) emission line properties of galaxies at ${z \sim 2-4.5}$. Here we combine VLT/MUSE Guaranteed Time Observations of the Hubble Deep Field South, Ultra Deep Field, COSMOS, and several quasar fields with other publicly available data from VLT/VIMOS and VLT/FORS2 to construct a catalogue of HeII$λ$1640 emitters at ${z\sim2}$. The deepest areas of our MUSE pointings reach a ${3σ}$ line flux limit of 3.1${\times}$10-19 erg/ s/ cm$^2$. After discarding broad line active galactic nuclei we find 13 HeII$λ$1640 detections from MUSE with a median MUV = $-20.1$ and 21 tentative HeII$λ$1640 detections from other public surveys. Excluding Ly$α$, all except two galaxies in our sample show at least one other rest-UV emission line, with CIII]$λ$1907,$λ$1909 being the most prominent. We use multi-wavelength data available in the Hubble legacy fields to derive basic galaxy properties of our sample via spectral energy distribution fitting techniques. Taking advantage of the high quality spectra obtained by MUSE (${\sim10 - 30}$h of exposure time per pointing), we use photo-ionisation models to study the rest-UV emission line diagnostics of the HeII$λ$1640 emitters. Line ratios of our sample can be reproduced by moderately sub-solar photo-ionisation models, however, we find that including effects of binary stars lead to degeneracies in most free parameters. Even after considering extra ionising photons produced by extreme sub-solar metallicity binary stellar models, photo-ionisation models are unable to reproduce rest-frame HeII$λ$1640 equivalent widths (${\sim}$ 0.2 - 10 A), thus additional mechanisms are necessary in models to match the observed HeII$λ$1640 properties.
Nebular HeII emission implies the presence of energetic photons (E$\ge$54 eV). Despite the great deal of effort dedicated to understanding HeII ionization, its origin has remained mysterious, particularly in metal-deficient star-forming (SF) galaxies. Unfolding HeII-emitting, metal-poor starbursts at z ~ 0 can yield insight into the powerful ionization processes occurring in the primordial universe. Here we present a new study on the effects that X-ray sources have on the HeII ionization in the extremely metal-poor galaxy IZw18 (Z ~ 3 % Zsolar), whose X-ray emission is dominated by a single hi…
New integral field spectroscopy has been obtained for IZw18, the nearby lowest-metallicity galaxy considered our best local analog of systems forming at high-z. Here we report the spatially resolved spectral map of the nebular HeII4686 emission in IZw18, from which we derived for the first time its total HeII-ionizing flux. Nebular HeII emission implies the existence of a hard radiation field. HeII-emitters are observed to be more frequent among high-z galaxies than for local objects. So investigating the HeII-ionizing source(s) in IZw18 may reveal the ionization processes at high-z. HeII emis…
The shape of the ionising spectra of galaxies is a key ingredient to reveal their physical properties and to our understanding of the ionising background radiation. A long-standing unsolved problem is the presence of HeII nebular emission in many low-metallicity star-forming galaxies. This emission requires ionising photons with energy >54 eV, which are not produced in sufficient amounts by normal stellar populations. To examine if high mass X-ray binaries and ultra-luminous X-ray sources (HMXB/ULX) can explain the observed HeII nebular emission and how their presence alters other emission lin…
The origin of nebular HeII emission, which is frequently observed in low-metallicity (O/H) star-forming galaxies, remains largely an unsolved question. Using the observed anticorrelation of the integrated X-ray luminosity per unit of star formation rate ($L_X/{\rm SFR}$) of an X-ray binary population with metallicity and other empirical data from the well-studied galaxy I Zw 18, we show that the observed HeII 4686 intensity and its trend with metallicity is naturally reproduced if the bulk of He$^+$ ionizing photons are emitted by the X-ray sources. We also show that a combination of X-ray bin…
HeII is the most sought-after emission line to detect and characterize metal free stellar populations. However, current stellar population/photo-ionization models lack sufficient He$^+$ ionising photons to reproduce observed HeII fluxes while being consistent with other emission lines. Using $\sim10-30$ hour deep pointings from MUSE, we obtain $\sim10$ $z\sim2-4$ HeII$\lambda1640$ emitters to study their inter-stellar medium (ISM) and stellar population properties. Emission line ratio diagnostics of our sample suggest that emission lines are driven by star-formation in solar to moderately sub-…
Nebular HeII$λ$4686Å~line emission is useful to unveil active galactic nuclei (AGN) residing in actively star-forming (SF) galaxies, typically missed by the standard BPT classification. Here we adopt the HeII diagnostic to identify hidden AGN in the Local Universe using for the first time spatially-resolved data from the Data Release 15 of the Mapping Nearby Galaxies at APO survey (MaNGA DR15). By combining results from HeII and BPT diagnostics, we overall select 459 AGN host candidates ($\sim$10% in MaNGA DR15), out of which 27 are identified as AGN by the HeII diagram only. The HeII-only AGN…
SBS0335-052E, one of the most metal-poor (Z ~ 3-4% Z$_{\odot}$) HeII-emitter starbursts known in the nearby universe, is studied using optical VLT/MUSE spectroscopic and Chandra X-ray observations. We spatially resolved the spectral map of the nebular HeII$λ$4686 emission from which we derived for the first time the total HeII-ionizing energy budget of SBS0335-052E. The nebular HeII line is indicative of a quite hard ionizing spectrum with photon energies > 4 Ryd, and is observed to be more common at high-z than locally. Our study rules out a significant contribution from X-ray sources and sho…
Understanding the ionizing spectrum of low-metallicity galaxies is of great importance for modeling and interpreting emission line observations of early/distant galaxies. Although a wide suite of stellar evolution, atmosphere, population synthesis, and photoionization models, taking many physical processes into account now exist, all models face a common problem: the inability to explain the presence of nebular HeII emission, which is observed in many low metallicity galaxies, both in UV and optical spectra. Several possible explanations have been proposed in the literature, including Wolf-Ray…
Despite significant progress both observationally and theoretically, the origin of high-ionization nebular HeII emission in galaxies dominated by stellar photoionization remains unclear. Accretion-powered radiation from high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) is still one of the leading proposed explanations for the missing $\mathrm{He^+}$-ionizing photons, but this scenario has yet to be conclusively tested. In this paper, we present nebular line predictions from a grid of photoionization models with input SEDs containing the joint contribution of both stellar atmospheres and a multi-color disk mode…
Constraining the density distribution of the cold Circumgalactic Medium of quasars at z>2 through Lya, HeII and Ha emission
INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste（意大利国家天体物理研究所的里雅斯特天文台）；Dipartimento di Fisica "G. Occhialini", Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca（米兰比可卡大学G. Occhialini物理系）；Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Riverside（加州大学河滨分校物理与天文学系）；Cahill Center for Astrophysics, California Institute of Technology（加州理工学院卡希尔天体物理学中心）；Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, The University of Tokyo（东京大学宇宙射线研究所）；Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, University of Groningen（格罗宁根大学卡普坦天文研究所）；Department of Physics, Informatics and Mathematics, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia（摩德纳和雷焦艾米利亚大学物理、信息学与数学系）
In a recent study star-forming galaxies with HeII emission between redshifts 2 and 4.6 have been found to occur in two modes, distinguished by the width of their HeII emission lines. Broad HeII emission has been attributed to stellar emission from a population of evolved Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars while narrow HeII emission has been attributed to nebular emission excited by a population of very hot PopIII stars formed in pockets of pristine gas at moderate redshifts. In this work we propose an alternative scenario for the origin of the narrow HeII emission, namely very massive stars (VMS) at low me…
We here report the detection of extended HeII4686 nebular emission in the central region of NGC1569 using the integral field spectrograph MEGARA at the 10.4-m Gran Telescopio Canarias. The observations cover a Field of View (FoV) of 12.5 arcsec x 11.3 arcsec at seeing-limited spatial resolution of ~15 pc and at a spectral resolution of R=6000 in the wavelength range 4330--5200 Angstrom. The emission extends over a semi-circular arc of ~40 pc width and ~150 pc diameter around the super star cluster A (SSC-A). The Av derived using Balmer decrement varies from the Galactic value of 1.6 mag to a m…
In the last few years, prominent high-ionization nebular emission lines (i.e., OIII], CIII], CIV, HeII) have been observed in the deep UV spectra of z~5-7 galaxies, indicating that extreme radiation fields characterize reionization-era systems. These lines have been linked to the leakage of Lyman continuum photons both theoretically and observationally. Consequently, high-ionization UV emission lines present our best probe to detect and characterize the most distant galaxies that we will observe in the coming years, and are key to understanding the sources of reionization, yet the physics gove…
We present the discovery of HLock01-LAB, a luminous and large Lya nebula at z=3.326. Medium-band imaging and long-slit spectroscopic observations with the Gran Telescopio Canarias reveal extended emission in the Lya 1215Å, CIV1550Å, and HeII 1640Ålines over ~100kpc, and a total luminosity L(Lya)=(6.4+/-0.1)x10^44 erg s^-1. HLock01-LAB presents an elongated morphology aligned with two faint radio sources contained within the central ~8kpc of the nebula. The radio structures are consistent to be faint radio jets or lobes of a central galaxy, whose spectrum shows nebular emission characteristic o…
Star-forming galaxies with nebular HeII emission contain very energetic ionizing sources of radiation, which can be considered as analogs to the major contributors of the reionization of the Universe in early epochs. It is therefore of great importance to provide a reliable absolute scale for the equivalent effective temperature (T*) for these sources. We study a sample of local (z< 0.2) star-forming galaxies showing optical nebular HeII emission using the so-called softness diagrams, involving emission lines of two elements in two consecutive stages of ionization (e.g., [SII]/[SIII] vs. [OII]…
The nature of the sources powering nebular HeII emission in star-forming galaxies remains debated, and various types of objects have been considered, including Wolf-Rayet stars, X-ray binaries, and Population III stars. Modern X-ray observations show the ubiquitous presence of hot gas filling star-forming galaxies. We use a collisional ionization plasma code to compute the specific HeII ionizing flux produced by hot gas and show that if its temperature is not too high (less than 2.5 MK), then the observed levels of soft diffuse X-ray radiation could explain HeII ionization in galaxies. To gain…
Utilizing {\it ab initio} ultra-high resolution hydrodynamical simulations, we investigate the properties of the interstellar and circum-galactic medium of Ly$α$ Blobs (LABs) at $z=3$, focusing on three important emission lines: Ly$α$ 1216Å, \heii 1640Å and \civ 1449Å. Their relative strengths provide a powerful probe of the thermodynamic properties of the gas when confronted with observations. By adjusting the dust attenuation effect using one parameter and matching the observed size-luminosity relation of LABs using another parameter, we show that our simulations can reproduce the observed \…
We conduct a deep narrow-band imaging survey of 13 Ly$α$ blobs (LABs) located in the SSA22 proto-cluster at z~3.1 in the CIV and HeII emission lines in an effort to constrain the physical process powering the Ly$α$ emission in LABs. Our observations probe down to unprecedented surface brightness limits of 2.1 $-$ 3.4 $\times$ 10$^{-18}$ erg s$^{-1}$ cm$^{-2}$ arcsec$^{-2}$ per 1 arcsec$^2$ aperture (5$σ$) for the HeII$λ$1640 and CIV$λ$1549 lines, respectively. We do not detect extended HeII and CIV emission in any of the LABs, placing strong upper limits on the HeII/Ly$α$ and CIV/Ly$α$ line ra…
With a projected size of about 450 kpc at z~2.3, the Slug Ly-alpha nebula is a rare laboratory to study, in emission, the properties of the intergalactic gas in the Cosmic Web. Since its discovery, the Slug has been the subject of several spectroscopic follow-ups to constrain the properties of the emitting gas. Here we report the results of a deep MUSE integral-field spectroscopic search for non-resonant, extended HeII1640 and metal emission. Extended HeII radiation is detected on scales of about 100 kpc, but only in some regions associated with the bright Ly-alpha emission and a continuum-det…
In order to perform a more complete census of active galactic nuclei (AGN) in the local Universe, we investigate the use of the HeII~$λ4685$ emission line diagnostic diagram by Shirazi & Brinchmann (2012) in addition to the standard methods based on other optical emission lines. The He II based diagnostics is more sensitive to AGN ionization in the presence of strong star formation than conventional line diagnostics. We survey a magnitude-limited sample of 63,915 galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7 at $0.02<z<0.05$ and use both the conventional BPT emission line diagnosti…
We investigate the potential for the emission lines OV] $λλ$1213.8,1218.3 and HeII $λ$1215.1 to contaminate flux measurements of Ly$α$ $λ$1215.7 in the extended nebulae of quasars. We have computed a grid of photoionization models with a substantial range in the slope of the ionizing powerlaw (-1.5 $<$ $α$ $<$ -0.5), gas metallicity (0.01 $<$ $Z/Z_{\odot}$ $<$ 3.0), gas density (1 $<$ $n_H$ $<$ 10$^4$ cm$^{-3}$), and ionization parameter (10$^{-5}$ $<$ U $<$ 1.0). We find the contribution from HeII $λ$1215.1 to be negligible, i.e., $<$ 0.1 of Ly$α$ flux, across our entire model grid. The contr…
We report the discovery of [NeV]3426 emission, in addition to HeII4686 emission, in six compact star-forming galaxies. These observations considerably increase the sample of eight such galaxies discovered earlier by our group. For four of the new galaxies, the optical observations are supplemented by near-infrared spectra. All galaxies, but one, have HII regions that are dense, with electron number densities of ~300-700 cm-3. They are all characterised by high Hbeta equivalent widths EW(Hbeta)~190-520A and high O32=[OIII]5007/[OII]3727 ratios of 10-30, indicating young starburst ages and the p…
We present an investigation of the low-frequency radio and ultraviolet properties of a sample of $\simeq$10,500 quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 14, observed as part of the first data release of the Low-Frequency-Array Two-metre Sky Survey. The quasars have redshifts $1.5 < z < 3.5$ and luminosities $44.6 < \log(L_{\text{bol}}/\text{erg s}^{-1}) < 47.2$. We employ ultraviolet spectral reconstructions based on an independent component analysis to parametrize the CIV$λ$1549-emission line that is used to infer the strength of accretion disc winds, and the HeII$λ$1640 line, a…
We present the Magellan/FIRE detection of highly-ionized CIV 1550 and OIII] 1666 in a deep infrared spectrum of the z=6.11 gravitationally lensed low-mass galaxy RXC J2248.7-4431-ID3, which has previously-known Lyman-alpha. No corresponding emission is detected at the expected location of HeII 1640. The upper limit on HeII paired with detection of OIII] and CIV constrains possible ionization scenarios. Production of CIV and OIII] requires ionizing photons of 2.5-3.5 Ryd, but once in that state their multiplet emission is powered by collisional excitation at lower energies (~0.5 Ryd). As a pure…
A recently-discovered class of outflows, extremely high-velocity outflows (EHVOs), may be key to understanding feedback processes as it is likely the most powerful in terms of mass-energy. These EHVOs have been observed at redshifts 1.052 < z_em < 7.641, but the potential connection with outflows in emission had not been studied. We find that EHVOs, albeit their small numbers at the moment, appear to show distinct CIV and HeII properties. In particular, EHVOs are more predominant in quasars with large blueshifts of the CIV emission line, suggesting a connection between emission and absorption …
We present Hubble Space Telescope (HST) imaging observations of the site of the Type-Ia supernova SN2011fe in the nearby galaxy M101, obtained about one year prior to the event, in a narrow band centred on the HeII 4686 Å emission line. In a "single-degenerate" progenitor scenario, the hard photon flux from an accreting white dwarf (WD), burning hydrogen on its surface over $\sim1$ Myr should, in principle, create a HeIII Strömgren sphere or shell surrounding the WD. Depending on the WD luminosity, the interstellar density, and the velocity of an outflow from the WD, the HeIII region could app…
Strong high-ionization lines such as HeII of young galaxies are puzzling at high and low redshift. Although recent studies suggest the existence of non-thermal sources, whether their ionizing spectra can consistently explain multiple major emission lines remains a question. Here we derive the general shapes of the ionizing spectra for three local extremely metal-poor galaxies (EMPGs) that show strong HeII$λ$4686. We parameterize the ionizing spectra composed of a blackbody and power-law radiation mimicking various stellar and non-thermal sources. We use photoionization models for nebulae, and …
Here we report the first spatially resolved spectroscopic study for the galaxy PHL293B using the high-resolution GTC/MEGARA IFU. PHL293B is a local, extremely metal-poor, high ionization galaxy. This makes PHL 293B an excellent analogue for galaxies in the early Universe. The MEGARA aperture (~12.5''x 11.3'') covers the entire PHL 293B main body and its far-reaching ionized gas. We created and discussed maps of all relevant emission lines, line ratios and physical-chemical properties of the ionized ISM. The narrow emission gas appears to be ionized mainly by massive stars according to the obse…
Using the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, we have obtained ultraviolet (UV) spectra from $\sim 1200$ to 2000 Å of known Lyman continuum (LyC) emitting galaxies at low redshift ($z \sim 0.3-0.4$) with varying absolute LyC escape fractions (fesc $\sim 0.01 - 0.72$). Our observations include in particular the galaxy J1243+4646, which has the highest known LyC escape fraction at low redshift. While all galaxies are known Lyman alpha emitters, we consistently detect an inventory of additional emission lines, including CIV 1550, HeII 1640, OIII] 1666, and CIII] 1909, whose origin is presumably…
The recent discovery by Cantalupo et al. (2014) of the largest (~500 kpc) and luminous Ly-alpha nebula associated with the quasar UM287 (z=2.279) poses a great challenge to our current understanding of the astrophysics of the halos hosting massive z~2 galaxies. Either an enormous reservoir of cool gas is required $M\simeq10^{12}$ $M_{\odot}$, exceeding the expected baryonic mass available, or one must invoke extreme gas clumping factors not present in high-resolution cosmological simulations. However, observations of Ly-alpha emission alone cannot distinguish between these two scenarios. We ha…
We compute synthetic optical and ultraviolet (UV) emission-line properties of galaxies in a full cosmological framework by coupling, in post-processing, new-generation nebular-emission models with high-resolution, cosmological zoom-in simulations of massive galaxies. Our self-consistent modelling accounts for nebular emission from young stars and accreting black holes (BHs). We investigate which optical- and UV-line diagnostic diagrams can best help to discern between the main ionizing sources, as traced by the ratio of BH accretion to star formation rates in model galaxies, over a wide range …
Deep observations have detected extended Ly$α$ emission nebulae surrounding tens of quasars at redshift 2 to 6. However, the metallicity of such extended haloes is still poorly understood. We perform a detailed analysis on a large sample of 80 quasars at $z\sim3$ based on MUSE-VLT data. We find clear evidence of extended emission of the UV nebular lines such as CIV or HeII for about 20$\%$ of the sample, while CIII] is only marginally detected in a few objects. By stacking the cubes we detect emission of CIV, HeII and CIII] out to a radius of about 45 kpc. CIV and HeII show a radial decline mu…
We revisit calculations of nebular hydrogen Lya and HeII 1640A line strengths for population III galaxies, undergoing continuous and bursts of star formation. We focus on initial mass functions (IMFs) motivated by recent theoretical studies, which generally span a lower range of stellar masses than earlier works. We also account for case-B departures and the stochastic sampling of the IMF. In agreement with previous works, we find that departures from case-B can enhance the Lya flux by a factor of a few, but we argue that this enhancement is driven mainly by collisional excitation and ionizati…
We present S82-20, an unusual redshift $\approx$3 object identified in SDSS-Stripe 82 broad-band images. The rest-frame ultraviolet spectrum of S82-20 shows emission lines from highly ionized species, including HeII $λ$1640, and the CIV $λλ$1548, 1550 and OVI $λλ$1032, 1038 doublets. The high Ly$α$ luminosity ($3.5\times 10^{44}$ erg s$^{-1}$), the high emission line equivalent widths ($>200$Å for Ly$α$), the FWHM of the emission lines ($<800$km s$^{-1}$), and the high ionization OVI line strongly support the interpretation that S82-20 is a Type~II QSO. However, photoionization models using Ty…
Consistent Gas-Phase Temperatures and Metallicities from UV and Optical Nebular Emission: A Reliable Foundation from z=0 to Cosmic Dawn
University of California Davis（加州大学戴维斯分校）；The Chinese University of Hong Kong（香港中文大学）；University of Kentucky（肯塔基大学）；The Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science（卡内基科学机构天文台）；University of Hawaii（夏威夷大学）；Sorbonne Université（索邦大学）
We introduce a HST/STIS stellar census of R136a, the central ionizing star cluster of 30 Doradus. We present low resolution far-ultraviolet STIS/MAMA spectroscopy of R136 using 17 contiguous 52x0.2 arcsec slits which together provide complete coverage of the central 0.85 parsec (3.4 arcsec). We provide spectral types of 90% of the 57 sources brighter than m_F555W = 16.0 mag within a radius of 0.5 parsec of R136a1, plus 8 additional nearby sources including R136b (O4\,If/WN8). We measure wind velocities for 52 early-type stars from CIV 1548-51, including 16 O2-3 stars. For the first time we spe…
Contemporary research suggests that the reionisation of the intergalactic medium (IGM) in the early Universe was predominantly realised by star-forming (proto-)galaxies (SFGs). Due to observational constraints, our knowledge on the origins of sufficient amounts of ionising Lyman continuum (LyC) photons and the mechanisms facilitating their transport into the IGM remains sparse. Recent efforts have thus focussed on the study of local analogues to these high-redshift objects. We used archival spectroscopic SDSS DR12 data to select a sample of low-z He II 4686 emitters and restricted it to a set …
Contrary to expectations from scenarios of black hole growth driven by galaxy interactions and mergers, dual active galactic nuclei (AGN) with kiloparsec separations are rarely observed and are very difficult to identify, in particular at high redshifts (i.e. z>2). Focussing on the recently discovered dual AGN system LBQS 0302-0019 at z=3.29, we seek to identify further group members in its environment and to understand their formation history through deep high-angular-resolution imaging. We present deep Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Wide-field Camera 3 near-infrared imaging of LBQS 0302-0019. …
Population III (Pop. III) stars, as of yet, have not been detected, however as we move into the era of extremely large telescopes this is likely to change. One likely tracer for Pop. III stars is the HeII$\lambda1640$ emission line, which will be detectable by the HARMONI spectrograph on the European Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) over a broad range of redshifts ($2\leq z\leq14$). By post-processing galaxies from the cosmological, AMR-hydrodynamical simulation NewHorizon with theoretical spectral energy distributions (SED) for Pop. III stars and radiative transfer (i.e. the Yggdrasil Models a…
We measure the strength of HeII$λ$4686 nebular emission in passively evolving ("retired") galaxies, aiming to constrain their populations of hot accreting white dwarfs (WDs) in the context of the single degenerate (SD) scenario of Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia). In the SD scenario, as a WD burns hydrogen-rich material accreted from a companion star, it becomes a powerful source of ionizing UV emission. If significant populations of such sources exist in galaxies, strong emission in the recombination lines of HeII should be expected from the interstellar medium. To explore this conjecture, we sele…
Throughout the epoch of reionization the most luminous Lyα emitters are capable of ionizing their own local bubbles. The CR7 galaxy at $z \approx 6.6$ stands out for its combination of exceptionally bright Lyα and HeII 1640 Angstrom line emission but absence of metal lines. As a result CR7 may be the first viable candidate host of a young primordial starburst or direct collapse black hole. High-resolution spectroscopy reveals a +160 km s$^{-1}$ velocity offset between the Lyα and HeII line peaks while the spatial extent of the Lyα emitting region is $\sim 16$ kpc. The observables are indicativ…
We explore the production and escape of ionizing photons in young galaxies by investigating the ultraviolet and optical emission-line properties of models of ionization-bounded and density-bounded HII regions, active-galactic-nucleus (AGN) narrow-line regions and radiative shocks computed all using the same physically-consistent description of element abundances and depletion on to dust grains down to very low metallicities. We compare these models with a reference sample of metal-poor star-forming galaxies and Lyman-continuum (LyC) leakers at various redshifts, which allows the simultaneous e…
The well-known quasar SDSS J095253.83+011421.9 (J0952+0114) at z=3.02 has one of the most peculiar spectra discovered so far, showing the presence of narrow Ly$α$ and broad metal emission lines. Although recent studies have suggested that a Proximate Damped Ly$α$ system (PDLA) causes this peculiar spectrum, the origin of the gas associated with the PDLA is unknown. Here we report the results of MUSE observations that reveal a new giant ($\approx$ 100 physical kpc) Lyman $α$ nebula. The detailed analysis of the Ly$α$ velocity, velocity dispersion, and surface brightness profiles suggests that t…
Faint Lyman-$α$ (Ly$α$) emitters become increasingly rarer towards the re-ionisation epoch (z~6-7). However, observations from a very large (~5deg$^2$) Ly$α$ survey at z=6.6 (Matthee et al. 2015) show that this is not the case for the most luminous emitters. Here we present follow-up observations of the two most luminous z~6.6 Ly$α$ candidates in the COSMOS field: `MASOSA' and `CR7'. We used X-SHOOTER, SINFONI and FORS2 (VLT), and DEIMOS (Keck), to confirm both candidates beyond any doubt. We find redshifts of z=6.541 and z=6.604 for MASOSA and CR7, respectively. MASOSA has a strong detection …
We present the results of a new reverberation mapping campaign for the broad-lined active galactic nucleus (AGN) in the edge-on spiral IC4329A. Monitoring of the optical continuum with $V-$band photometry and broad emission-line flux variability with moderate-resolution spectroscopy allowed emission-line light curves to be measured for H$β$, H$γ$, and HeII $λ4686$. We find a time delay of $16.3^{+2.6}_{-2.3}$ days for H$β$, a similar time delay of $16.0^{+4.8}_{-2.6}$ days for H$γ$, and an unresolved time delay of $-0.6^{+3.9}_{-3.9}$ days for HeII. The time delay for H$β$ is consistent with t…
