Population III Star Clusters in the Reionized Universe

TL;DR

This paper estimates the abundance and observability of Population III star clusters in the reionized universe, predicting their potential detection by JWST and their relation to dark matter haloes and reionization history.

Contribution

It provides the first estimates of Pop III star cluster abundance post-reionization and discusses their detectability and environmental conditions.

Findings

Up to a thousand Pop III clusters per square degree may be observable at 2 < z < 7.

Pop III clusters are most likely found at z > 3 near 10^11 M_Sun dark matter haloes.

Detection of these clusters can constrain the Pop III initial mass function (IMF).

Abstract

In reionized regions of the Universe, gas can only collapse to form stars in dark matter (DM) haloes which grow to be sufficiently massive. If star formation is prevented in the minihalo progenitors of such DM haloes at redshifts z >~ 20, then these haloes will not be self-enriched with metals and so may host Population (Pop) III star formation. We estimate an upper limit for the abundance of Pop III star clusters which thus form in the reionized Universe, as a function of redshift. Depending on the minimum DM halo mass for star formation, between of the order of one and of the order of a thousand Pop III star clusters per square degree may be observable at 2 <~ z <~ 7. Thus, there may be a sufficient number density of Pop III star clusters for detection in surveys such as the Deep-Wide Survey (DWS) to be conducted by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). We predict that Pop III clusters formed after reionization are most likely to be found at z >~ 3 and within ~ 40 arcsec (~ 1 Mpc comoving) of DM haloes with masses of ~ 10^11 M_Sun, the descendants of the haloes at z ~ 20 which host the first galaxies that begin reionization. If the stellar initial mass function (IMF) is top-heavy the clusters may have sufficiently high luminosities in both Ly_alpha and He II lambda1640 to be detected and for constraints to be placed on the Pop III IMF. While a small fraction of DM haloes with masses as high as ~10^9 M_Sun at redshifts z <~ 4 are not enriched due to star formation in their progenitors, external metal enrichment due to galactic winds is likely to preclude Pop III star formation in a large fraction of otherwise unenriched haloes, perhaps even preventing star formation in pristine haloes altogether after reionization is complete.