Normal Stellar Population Research Articles

The Study of Helium Variations in Star Clusters Using China Space Station Telescope

The China Space Station Telescope (CSST) is a 2 m space-based optical-UV telescope. Its primary goal is to carry out a high-resolution photometric imaging survey of a 17,500 square degree sky area using the on board Survey Camera. With its wide field of view (1.1 square degrees) and a mosaic imager containing 640 million pixels, studying the different populations of stars within star clusters is highly feasible. The aim of this study is to assess the CSST’s ability to distinguish between stellar populations with varying helium abundance levels, with the help of Modules for Experiments in Stellar Astrophysics. The results of the CSST’s photometry for these different populations are presented by transferring the models into the CSST Survey Camera photometric system. The findings confirm that helium-enriched stellar populations will have unique patterns in the color–magnitude diagrams under the CSST photometric system, compared to normal stellar populations. The CSST, with its filters and wide field of view of the Survey Camera, provides a new avenue for the study of multiple populations in star clusters.

A Lower Bound of Star Formation Activity in Ultra-high-redshift Galaxies Detected with JWST: Implications for Stellar Populations and Radiation Sources

Early results of James Webb Space Telescope observations have delivered bright z ≳ 10 galaxy candidates in greater numbers than expected, enabling construction of rest-frame UV luminosity functions (LFs). The LFs contain key information on the galaxy assembly history, star formation activity, and stellar population of the distant universe. Given an upper bound of the total baryonic mass inflow rate to galaxies from their parent halos estimated from abundance matching, we derive a lower bound on the product of the star formation and UV photon production efficiency in galaxies at each redshift. This stringent constraint requires a high efficiency (≳10%–30%) converting gas into stars, assuming a normal stellar population with a Salpeter-like mass distribution. The efficiency is substantially higher than those of typical nearby galaxies, but is consistent with those seen in starburst galaxies and super-star clusters observed in the nearby universe. Alternatively, the star formation efficiency may be as low as a few percent, which is the average value for the entire galaxy population at z ≃ 6, if the stellar population is metal-free and drawn from a top-heavy mass distribution that produces more intense UV radiation. We discuss several other possible scenarios to achieve the constraint, for instance, energetic radiation produced from compact stellar remnants and quasars, and propose ways to distinguish the scenarios by forthcoming observations.

A study of 1000 galaxies with unusually young and massive stars in the SDSS: a search for hidden black holes

ABSTRACT We select 1076 galaxies with extinction-corrected H α equivalent widths too large to be explained with a Kroupa initial mass function, and compare these with a control sample of galaxies that is matched in stellar mass, redshift, and 4000 Å break strength, but with normal H α equivalent widths. Our goal is to study how processes such as black hole growth and energetic feedback processes from massive stars differ between galaxies with extreme central H α emission and galaxies with normal young central stellar populations. The stellar mass distribution of H α excess galaxies is peaked at $3 \times 10^{10}\, {\rm M}_{\odot }$ and almost all fall well within the star-forming locus in the [O iii]/H β versus [N ii]/H α Baldwin, Philipps & Terlevich diagram. H α excess galaxies are twice as likely to exhibit H α line asymmetries and 1.55 times more likely to be detected at 1 GHz in the VLA FIRST survey compared to control sample galaxies. The radio luminosity per unit stellar mass decreases with the stellar age of the system. Using stacked spectra, we demonstrate that [Ne v] emission is not present in the very youngest of the radio-quiet H α excess galaxies with detectable Wolf–Rayet features, suggesting that black hole growth has not yet commenced in such systems. [Ne v] emission is detected in H α excess galaxies with radio detections and the strength of the line correlates with the radio luminosity. This is the clearest indication for a population of black holes that may be forming in a subset of the H α excess population.

Can nebular He II emission be explained by ultra-luminous X-ray sources?

Context. The shape of the ionising spectra of galaxies is a key ingredient to reveal their physical properties and for our understanding of the ionising background radiation. A long-standing unsolved problem is the presence of He II nebular emission in many low-metallicity star-forming galaxies. This emission requires ionising photons with an energy > 54 eV; it is important to note that these particular photons are not produced in sufficient amounts by normal stellar populations. Aims. To examine if high mass X-ray binaries and ultra-luminous X-ray sources (HMXBs and ULXs) can explain the observed He II nebular emission and how their presence alters other emission lines, we computed photoionisation models of galaxies including such sources. Methods. We combined spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of integrated stellar populations with constrained SEDs of ULXs to obtain composite spectra with varying amounts of X-ray luminosity, parameterised by LX/SFR. With these, we computed photoionisation models to predict the emission line fluxes of the optical recombination lines of H and He+, as well as the main metal lines of [O III], [O II], [O I], and [N II]. The predictions were then compared to a large sample of low-metallicity galaxies. Results. We find that it is possible to reproduce the nebular He II λ4686 and other line observations with our spectra and with amounts of LX/SFR compatible with the observations. Our work suggests that HMBXs and ULXs could be responsible for the observed nebular He II emission. However, the strengths of the high and low ionisation lines, such as He II and [O I] λ6300, strongly depend on the X-ray contribution and on the assumed SEDs of the high energy source(s), the latter being poorly known.

A New Sample of Warm Extreme Debris Disks from the ALLWISE Catalog

Abstract Extreme debris disks (EDDs) are rare systems with peculiarly large amounts of warm dust that may stem from recent giant impacts between planetary embryos during the final phases of terrestrial planet growth. Here we report on the identification and characterization of six new EDDs. These disks surround F5-G9 type main-sequence stars with ages >100 Myr, have dust temperatures higher than 300 K, and fractional luminosities between 0.01 and 0.07. Using time-domain photometric data at 3.4 and 4.6 μm from the WISE all-sky surveys, we conclude that four of these disks exhibited variable mid-infrared (IR) emission between 2010 and 2019. Analyzing the sample of all known EDDs, now expanded to 17 objects, we find that 14 of them showed changes at 3–5 μm over the past decade, suggesting that mid-IR variability is an inherent characteristic of EDDs. We also report that wide-orbit pairs are significantly more common in EDD systems than in the normal stellar population. While current models of rocky planet formation predict that the majority of giant collisions occur in the first 100 Myr, we find that the sample of EDDs is dominated by systems older than this age. This raises the possibility that the era of giant impacts may be longer than we think, or that some other mechanism(s) can also produce EDDs. We examine a scenario where the observed warm dust stems from the disruption and/or collisions of comets delivered from an outer reservoir into the inner regions, and explore what role the wide companions could play in this process.

WEIGHING STARS: THE IDENTIFICATION OF AN EVOLVED BLUE STRAGGLER STAR IN THE GLOBULAR CLUSTER 47 TUCANAE*

ABSTRACT Globular clusters are known to host peculiar objects named blue straggler stars (BSSs), significantly heavier than the normal stellar population. While these stars can be easily identified during their core hydrogen-burning phase, they are photometrically indistinguishable from their low-mass sisters in advanced stages of the subsequent evolution. A clear-cut identification of these objects would require the direct measurement of the stellar mass. We used the detailed comparison between chemical abundances derived from neutral and from ionized spectral lines as a powerful stellar “weighing device” to measure stellar mass and to identify an evolved BSS in 47 Tucanae. In particular, high-resolution spectra of three bright stars, located slightly above the level of the “canonical” horizontal branch (HB) sequence in the color–magnitude diagram of 47 Tucanae, have been obtained with the UVES spectrograph. The measurements of iron and titanium abundances performed separately from neutral and ionized lines reveal that two targets have stellar parameters fully consistent with those expected for low-mass post-HB objects, while for the other target the elemental ionization balance is obtained only by assuming a mass of ∼ 1.4 M ⊙ ?> , which is significantly larger than the main sequence turn-off mass of the cluster ( ∼ 0.85 M ⊙ ?> ). The comparison with theoretical stellar tracks suggests that this is a BSS descendant possibly experiencing its core helium-burning phase. The large applicability of the proposed method to most of the globular clusters in our Galaxy opens the possibility to initiate systematic searches for evolved BSSs, thus giving access to still unexplored phases of their evolution.

Precision age indicators that exploit chemically peculiar stars

We would like to find a way to improve the determination of galaxy star formation history from integrated light spectroscopy. To this end, several classes of chemically peculiar (CP) stars arise during the course of normal evolution in single stars and noninteracting binary stars. An aging stellar population has periods of time in which CP stars contribute to the integrated light, and others in which the contributions fade. The HgMn stars, for example, occupy a narrow temperature range of 10500 to 16000 K, which maps to a narrow range of ages. Wolf-Rayet stars, He-poor stars, Bp-Ap stars, Am-Fm stars, and C stars all become very common in a normal stellar population at various ages between zero and several Gyr, fading in and out in a way that is analogous to features used in stellar spectral classification. We examine population fractions and light fractions in order to assess the feasibility of using CP stars as age tracers. We find that, even though CP stars do not usually dominate in number, there are enough of them so that the CP spectral features are detectable in high-quality integrated spectra of young and intermediate age stellar populations. The new technique should be calibratable and useful. Furthermore, using CP signatures as age dating tools sidesteps reliance on photometry that is susceptible to dust and Balmer features that are susceptible to nebular fill-in.

EVIDENCE FOR PopIII-LIKE STELLAR POPULATIONS IN THE MOST LUMINOUS LyαEMITTERS AT THE EPOCH OF REIONIZATION: SPECTROSCOPIC CONFIRMATION

Faint Lyman-$\alpha$ (Ly$\alpha$) emitters become increasingly rarer towards the re-ionisation epoch (z~6-7). However, observations from a very large (~5deg$^2$) Ly$\alpha$ 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$\alpha$ 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 in Ly$\alpha$ with a line width of $386\pm30$ km/s (FWHM) and with high EW$_0$ (>200 \AA), but it is undetected in the continuum. CR7, with an observed Ly$\alpha$ luminosity of $10^{43.93\pm0.05}$erg/s is the most luminous Ly$\alpha$ emitter ever found at z>6. CR7 reveals a narrow Ly$\alpha$ line with $266\pm15$ km/s FWHM, being detected in the NIR (rest-frame UV, with $\beta=-2.3\pm0.1$) with an excess in $J$, and also strongly detected in IRAC/Spitzer. We detect a narrow HeII1640$\AA$ emission line ($6\sigma$) which explains the excess seen in the $J$ band photometry (EW$_0$~80 \AA). We find no other emission lines from the UV to the NIR in our X-SHOOTER spectra (HeII/OIII]1663A>3 and HeII/CIII]1908A>2.5). We find that CR7 is best explained by a combination of a PopIII-like population which dominates the rest-frame UV and the nebular emission, and a more normal stellar population which dominates the mass. HST/WFC3 observations show that the light is indeed spatially separated between a very blue component, coincident with Ly$\alpha$ and HeII emission, and two red components (~5 kpc away), which dominate the mass. Our findings are consistent with theoretical predictions of a PopIII wave, with PopIII star formation migrating away from the original sites of star formation.

A Lyα EMITTER WITH AN EXTREMELY LARGE REST-FRAME EQUIVALENT WIDTH OF ∼900 Å ATz= 6.5: A CANDIDATE POPULATION III-DOMINATED GALAXY?

We have identified a very interesting Ly-alpha emitter, whose Ly-alpha emission line has an extremely large observed equivalent width of EW_0=436^{+422}_{-149}A, which corresponds to an extraordinarily large intrinsic rest-frame equivalent width of EW_0^{int}=872^{+844}_{-298}A after the average intergalactic absorption correction. The object was spectroscopically confirmed to be a real Ly-alpha emitter by its apparent asymmetric Ly-alpha line profile detected at z=6.538. The continuum emission of the object was definitely detected in our deep z'-band image; thus, its EW_0 was reliably determined. Follow-up deep near-infrared spectroscopy revealed emission lines of neither He II lambda1640 as an apparent signature of Population III, nor C IV lambda1549 as a proof of active nucleus. No detection of short-lived He II lambda1640 line is not necessarily inconsistent with the interpretation that the underlying stellar population of the object is dominated by Population III. We found that the observed extremely large EW_0 of the Ly-alpha emission and the upper limit on the EW_0 of the He II lambda1640 emission can be explained by population synthesis models favoring a very young age less than 2-4Myr and massive metal-poor (Z<10^{-5}) or even metal-free stars. The observed large EW_0 of Ly-alpha is hardly explained by Population I/II synthesis models with Z>10^{-3}. However, we cannot conclusively rule out the possibility that this object is composed of a normal stellar population with a clumpy dust distribution, which could enhance the Ly-alpha EW_0, though its significance is still unclear.

SEGUE-2 LIMITS ON METAL-RICH OLD-POPULATION HYPERVELOCITY STARS IN THE GALACTIC HALO

We present new limits on the ejection of metal-rich old-population hypervelocity stars from the Galactic center (GC) as probed by the SEGUE-2 survey. Our limits are a factor of 3-10 more stringent than previously reported, depending on stellar type. Compared to the known population of B-star ejectees, there can be no more than 30 times more metal-rich old-population F/G stars ejected from the GC. Because B stars comprise a tiny fraction of a normal stellar population, this places significant limits on a combination of the GC mass function and the ejection mechanism for hypervelocity stars. In the presence of a normal GC mass function, our results require an ejection mechanism that is about 5.5 times more efficient at ejecting B-stars compared to low-mass F/G stars.

ON THE STELLAR POPULATIONS AND EVOLUTION OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES AT 6.3 &lt;z⩽ 8.6

We study the physical characteristics of galaxies at 6.3 < z < 8.6, selected from deep near-infrared imaging with the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) on board the Hubble Space Telescope. Accounting for the photometric scatter using simulations, galaxies at z ~ 7 have bluer UV colors compared to typical local starburst galaxies at > 4 sigma confidence. Although these colors necessitate young ages (<100 Myr), low or zero dust attenuation, and low metallicities, these are explicable by normal (albeit unreddened) stellar populations, with no evidence for near-zero metallicities and/or top-heavy initial mass functions. The age of the Universe at these redshifts limits the amount of stellar mass in late-type populations, and the WFC3 photometry implies galaxy stellar masses ~ 10^8 - 10^9 Msol for Salpeter initial mass functions to a limiting magnitude of M_1500 ~ -18. The masses of ``characteristic'' (L*) z > 7 galaxies are smaller than those of L* Lyman break galaxies (LBGs) at lower redshifts, and are comparable to less evolved galaxies selected on the basis of their Lyman alpha emission at 3 < z < 6, implying that the 6.3 < z < 8.6 galaxies are the progenitors of more evolved galaxies at lower redshifts. We estimate that Lyman alpha emission is able to contribute to the observed WFC3 colors of galaxies at these redshifts, with an estimated typical line flux of ~ 10^-18 erg s^-1 cm^-2, roughly a factor of four below currently planned surveys. The integrated UV specific luminosity for the detected galaxies at z ~ 7 and z ~ 8 is within factors of a few of that required to reionize the IGM assuming low clumping factors, implying that in order to reionize the Universe galaxies at these redshifts have a high ( ~ 50%) escape fraction of Lyman continuum photons, possibly substantiated by the very blue colors of this population.

Direct detection of galaxy stellar halos: NGC 3957 as a test case

We present a direct detection of the stellar halo of the edge-on S0 galaxy NGC 3957, using ultra-deep VLT/VIMOS V and R images. This is achieved with a sky subtraction strategy based on infrared techniques. These observations allow us to reach unprecedented high signal-to-noise ratios up to 15 kpc away from the galaxy center, rendering photon-noise negligible. The 1 sigma detection limits are R = 30.6 mag/arcsec^2 and V = 31.4 mag/arcsec^2. We conduct a thorough analysis of the possible sources of systematic errors that could affect the data: flat-fielding, differences in CCD responses, scaling of the sky background, the extended halo itself, and PSF wings. We conclude that the V-R colour of the NGC 3957 halo, calculated between 5 and 8 kpc above the disc plane where the systematic errors are modest, is consistent with an old and preferentially metal-poor normal stellar population, like that revealed in nearby galaxy halos from studies of their resolved stellar content. We do not find support for the extremely red colours found in earlier studies of diffuse halo emission, which we suggest might have been due to residual systematic errors.

Supermassive black hole formation by direct collapse: keeping protogalactic gas H2free in dark matter haloes with virial temperaturesTvir&gt;rsim 104K

In the absence of H_2 molecules, the primordial gas in early dark matter halos with virial temperatures just above T_vir >~ 10^4 K cools by collisional excitation of atomic H. Although it cools efficiently, this gas remains relatively hot, at a temperature near T ~ 8000 K, and consequently might be able to avoid fragmentation and collapse directly into a supermassive black hole (SMBH). In order for H_2--formation and cooling to be strongly suppressed, the gas must be irradiated by a sufficiently intense ultraviolet (UV) flux. We performed a suite of three--dimensional hydrodynamical adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) simulations of gas collapse in three different protogalactic halos with T_vir >~ 10^4 K, irradiated by a UV flux with various intensities and spectra. We determined the critical specific intensity, Jcrit, required to suppress H_2 cooling in each of the three halos. For a hard spectrum representative of metal--free stars, we find (in units of 10^{-21} erg s^{-1} Hz^{-1} sr^{-1} cm^{-2}) 10^4<Jcrit<10^5, while for a softer spectrum, which is characteristic of a normal stellar population, and for which H^{-} --dissociation is important, we find 30<Jcrit<300. These values are a factor of 3--10 lower than previous estimates. We attribute the difference to the higher, more accurate H_2 collisional dissociation rate we adopted. The reduction in Jcrit exponentially increases the number of rare halos exposed to super--critical radiation. When H_2 cooling is suppressed, gas collapse starts with a delay, but it ultimately proceeds more rapidly. The infall velocity is near the increased sound speed, and an object as massive as M ~ 10^5 solar mass may form at the center of these halos, compared to the M ~ 10^2 solar mass stars forming when H_2--cooling is efficient.

The faint outskirts of the blue compact galaxy Haro 11: is there a red excess?

Previous studies of the low surface brightness host of the blue compact galaxy (BCG) Haro 11 have suggested an abnormally red color of V-K=4.2+-0.8 for the host galaxy. This color is inconsistent with any normal stellar population over a wide range of stellar metallicities (Z=0.001-0.02). Similar though less extreme host colors have been measured for other BCGs and may be reconciled with population synthesis models, provided that the stellar metallicity of the host is higher than that of the ionized gas in the central starburst. We present the deepest V and K band observations to date of Haro 11 and derive a new V-K color for the host galaxy. Our new data suggest a far less extreme colour of V-K=2.3+-0.2, which is perfectly consistent with the expectations for an old host galaxy with the same metallicty as that derived from nebular emission lines in the star-forming center.

A Luminosity Function of Lyα‐emitting Galaxies atz≈ 4.5

We present a catalog of 59 -->z ? 4.5 Ly?-emitting galaxies spectroscopically confirmed in a campaign of Keck DEIMOS follow-up observations to candidates selected in the Large Area Ly? (LALA) narrowband imaging survey. We targeted 97 candidates for spectroscopic follow-up; by accounting for the variety of conditions under which we performed spectroscopy, we estimate a selection reliability of ~76%. Together with our previous sample of Keck LRIS confirmations, the 59 sources confirmed herein bring the total catalog to 73 spectroscopically confirmed -->z ? 4.5 Ly?-emitting galaxies in the 0.7 deg2 covered by the LALA imaging. As with the Keck LRIS sample, we find that a nonnegligible fraction of the confirmed Ly? lines have rest-frame equivalent widths ( -->W?rest) that exceed the maximum predicted for normal stellar populations: 17%-31% (93% confidence) of the detected galaxies show -->W?rest > 190 ?, and 12%-27% (90% confidence) show -->W?rest > 240 ?. We construct a luminosity function of -->z ? 4.5 Ly? emission lines for comparison to Ly? luminosity functions spanning -->3.1 z ? 3 to -->z ? 6. This result supports the conclusion that the intergalactic medium remains largely reionized from the local universe out to -->z ? 6.5. It is somewhat at odds with the pronounced drop in the cosmic star formation rate density recently measured between -->z ~ 3 and -->z ~ 6 in continuum-selected Lyman-break galaxies, and therefore potentially sheds light on the relationship between the two populations.

The Infrared Properties of Hickson Compact Groups

Compact groups of galaxies provide a unique environment to study the mechanisms by which star formation occurs amid continuous gravitational encounters. We present 2MASS (JHK) and Spitzer IRAC (3.5-8 μm) and MIPS (24 μm) observations of a sample of 12 Hickson Compact Groups (HCGs 2, 7, 16, 19, 22, 31, 42, 48, 59, 61, 62, and 90) that includes a total of 45 galaxies. The infrared colors of the galaxies in this sample span a range of parameter space, and some trends are apparent in the data. The near-infrared colors of the sample galaxies are largely consistent with being dominated by slightly reddened normal stellar populations. There is also some evidence for a K-band excess in a few cases, which likely indicates the presence of hot dust at or near the sublimation temperature associated with active galactic nuclei or star formation activity. Galaxies that have the most significant polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon and/or hot dust emission (as inferred from excess 8 μm flux) also tend to have larger amounts of extinction and/or K-band excess and stronger 24 μm emission, all of which suggest ongoing star formation activity. We separate the 12 HCGs in our sample into three types based on the ratio of the group H I mass to dynamical mass. We find evidence that galaxies in the most gas-rich groups tend to be the most actively star forming. Galaxies in the most gas-poor groups tend to be tightly clustered around a narrow range in colors consistent with the integrated light from a normal stellar population. We interpret these trends as indicating that galaxies in gas-rich groups experience star formation and/or nuclear actively until their neutral gas is consumed, stripped, or ionized. The galaxies in this sample exhibit a between gas-rich and gas-poor groups in infrared color space that is sparsely populated and not seen in the Spitzer First Look Survey sample. This gap may suggest a rapid evolution of galaxy properties in response to dynamical effects. These results suggest that the global properties of the groups and the local properties of the galaxies are connected.

Edge-on Low Surface Brightness Galaxies in the SDSS and the Red Halo Phenomenon

AbstractExtremely red halos have been detected around high surface brightness (HSB) disk galaxies and blue compact galaxies. We analyse the halo emission of a sample of 970 stacked edge-on low surface brightness (LSB) galaxies in the SDSS (DR4) down to μg ~ 30 mag arcsec−2. These are divided by g − r colour limits into a “blue” Sample A (336 galaxies), “yellow” Sample B (318 galaxies) and “red” Sample C (316 galaxies). The gri colours indicate a prominent red excess in the polar direction, strongly deviating from any normal stellar population.

Significant primordial star formation at redshifts z ≈ 3–4

Four recent observational results have challenged our understanding of high-redshift galaxies, as they require the presence of far more ultraviolet photons than should be emitted by normal stellar populations. First, there is significant ultraviolet emission from Lyman break galaxies (LBGs) at wavelengths shorter than 912 A. Second, there is strong Lyman alpha emission from extended 'blobs' with little or no associated apparent ionizing continuum. Third, there is a population of galaxies with unusually strong Lyman alpha emission lines. And fourth, there is a strong He II (1,640 A) emission line in a composite of LBGs. The proposed explanations for the first three observations are internally inconsistent, and the fourth puzzle has remained hitherto unexplained. Here we show that all four problems are resolved simultaneously if 10-30 per cent of the stars in many galaxies at z approximately 3-4 are mainly primordial--unenriched by elements heavier than helium ('metals'). Most models of hierarchical galaxy formation assume efficient intragalactic metal mixing, and therefore do not predict metal-free star formation at redshifts significantly below z approximately 5. Our results imply that micromixing of metals within galaxies is inefficient on an approximately gigayear timescale, a conclusion that can be verified with higher-resolution simulations, and future observations of the He ii emission line.

Spectroscopic Properties of thez≈ 4.5 Lyα Emitters

We present Keck Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer optical spectra of 17 Lyα-emitting galaxies and one Lyman break galaxy at z ≈ 4.5 discovered in the Large Area Lyman Alpha survey. The survey has identified a sample of ~350 candidate Lyα-emitting galaxies at z ≈ 4.5 in a search volume of 1.5 × 106 comoving Mpc3. We targeted 25 candidates for spectroscopy; hence, the 18 confirmations presented herein suggest a selection reliability of 72%. The large equivalent widths (median W ≈ 80 A) but narrow physical widths (Δv 240 A, exceeding the maximum Lyα equivalent width predicted for normal stellar populations. Nonetheless, we find no evidence for He II λ1640 emission in either individual or composite spectra, indicating that although these galaxies are young, they are not truly primitive, Population III objects.

Hierarchical Structure Formation and Chemical Evolution of Galaxies

We present an analytical and phenomenological model for metal enrichment in halos based on hierarchical structure formation. This model assumes that astration of normal stellar populations along with Type II supernovae (SNe II) already occurs at very high redshift. It focuses on the regime of [Fe/H] -1, in which SNe Ia are major contributors, is also discussed in general. For halos that are not disrupted by SN II explosions, the chemical evolution of the gas and stars is explicitly determined by the rate of gas infall as compared with the astration rate and the corresponding rate of metal production by SNe II per H atom in the gas. This model provides a good description of the data on [Fe/H] for damped Lyα systems over a wide range of redshift, 0.5 < z < 5. For all halos not disrupted by SN II explosions, if there is a cessation of gas infall, the metallicities of the stars follow a bimodal distribution. This distribution is characterized by a sharp peak at the value of [Fe/H] corresponding to the time of infall cessation and by a broad peak at a higher value of [Fe/H] corresponding to the subsequent period of astration during which the bulk of the remaining gas forms stars. Such a distribution can be compared with that observed for the Galactic halo stars. If the gas in a halo is rapidly lost on cessation of infall, then an assemblage of stars with a very sharply defined [Fe/H] value will be left behind. This assemblage of stars may be accreted by a larger system and become a globular cluster of the larger system. We discuss the masses and metallicities of the globular clusters in this model considering the criterion for the onset of astration and possible disruption of low-mass halos by SN II explosions. The implications of possible globular clusters with very low metallicities of [Fe/H] ≾-3 are also discussed.