A Definitive Survey for Lyman Limit Systems at z~3.5 with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey

TL;DR

This study conducts a semi-automated survey of Lyman Limit Systems at z~3.5 using SDSS data, providing new measurements of their incidence, evolution, and implications for the HI distribution, with systematic uncertainties considered.

Contribution

It offers the first comprehensive analysis of LLS incidence at z~3.5 with a large quasar sample, refining previous estimates and constraining the HI distribution function.

Findings

The incidence of LLSs follows a single power-law with redshift, with parameters C_LLS=1.9 and gamma=5.2.

The number density and size of LLSs decrease by about 50% from z=4 to 3.3.

The HI distribution function likely has multiple inflections, indicating complex structure in the intergalactic medium.

Abstract

We perform a semi-automated survey for tau>=2 Lyman Limit systems (LLSs) in quasar spectra from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, Data Release 7. From a starting sample of 2473 quasars with zem=3.6-4.4, we analyze 469 spectra meeting strict seletion criteria for a total redshift path Dz=93.8 and identify 192 intervening systems at z>3.3. The incidence of tau>=2 LLSs per unit redshift, l(z), is well described by a single-power law at these redshifts: l(z) = C_LLS [(1+z)/(1+z_*)]^gamma, with z_*=3.7, C_LLS = 1.9+/-0.2, and gamma = 5.2+/-1.5 (68% c.l.). These values are systematically lower than previous estimates (especially at z<4) but are consistent with recent measurements of the mean free path to ionizing radiation. Extrapolations of this power-law to z=0 are inconsistent with previous estimations of l(z) at z<1 and suggest a break at z~2, similar to that observed for the Lya forest. Our results also indicate that the systems giving rise to LLS absorption decrease by ~50% in comoving number density and/or physical size from z=4 to 3.3, perhaps due to an enhanced extragalactic ultraviolet background. The observations place an integral constraint on the HI frequency distribution f(N_HI,X) and indicate that the power-law slope beta= dln[f(N,X)]/dln[N] is likely shallower than beta = -1 at N_HI=10^18 cm^-2. Including other constraints on f(N_HI,X) from the literature, we infer that beta is steeper than beta = -1.7 at N_HI~10^15 cm^-2, implying at least two inflections in f(N_HI,X). We also perform a survey for proximate LLSs (PLLSs) and find that l(z)_PLLS is systematically lower ~25% than intervening systems. Finally, we estimate that systematic effects impose an uncertainty of 10-20% in the l(z) measurements; these effects may limit the precision of all future surveys.