NIR spectroscopy of star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 1.4 with Subaru/FMOS: the mass-metallicity relation

Kiyoto Yabe*, Kouji Ohta, Fumihide Iwamuro, Suraphong Yuma, Masayuki Akiyama, Naoyuki Tamura, Masahiko Kimura, Naruhisa Takato, Yuuki Moritani, Masanao Sumiyoshi, Toshinori Maihara, John Silverman, Gavin Dalton, Ian Lewis, David Bonfield, Hanshin Lee, Emma Curtis-Lake, Edward MacAulay, Fraser Clarke

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

We present near-infrared spectroscopic observations of star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 1.4 with FMOS on the Subaru Telescope. We observed K-band selected galaxies in the SXDS/UDS fields with K ≤ 23.9mag, 1.2 ≤ zph ≤ 1.6,M ≥ 10 9.5M, and expected F(Hα) ≥ 10 -16 erg s -1cm -2; 71 objects in the sample have significant detections of H?. For these objects, excluding possible AGNs, identified from the BPT diagram, gas-phase metallicities were obtained from the [N II] /Hα line ratio. The sample is split into three stellar-mass bins, and the spectra are stacked in each stellar-mass bin. The mass-metallicity relation obtained at z ∼ 1.4 is located between those at z ∼ 0.8 and z ∼ 2.2. We constrain the intrinsic scatter to be ∼0.1 dex, or larger in the mass-metallicity relation at z ∼ 1.4; the scatter may be larger at higher redshifts. We found trends that the deviation from the mass-metallicity relation depends on the SFR (Star-formation rate) and the half light radius: Galaxies with higher SFR and larger half light radii show lower metallicities at a given stellar mass. One possible scenario for the trends is the infall of pristine gas accreted from IGM, or through merger events. Our data points show larger scatter than the fundamental metallicity relation (FMR) at z ∼ 0.1, and the averagemetallicities slightly deviate fromthe FMR. The compilation of themass- metallicity relations at z ∼ 3 to z ∼ 0.1 shows that they evolve smoothly from z ∼ 3 to z ∼ 0 without changing the shape so much, except for the massive part at z ∼ 0.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)60.1-60.19
Number of pages19
JournalPublications of the Astronomical Society of Japan
Volume64
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 25 Jun 2012

Keywords

  • Galaxies: Abundances
  • Galaxies: Evolution
  • Galaxies: High-redshift

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