Galaxy properties in different environments at z > 1.5 in the GOODS-NICMOS Survey

TL;DR

This study investigates how galaxy colour, stellar mass, and local environment relate at redshifts up to 3, revealing a persistent mass-colour link and a potential reversal of the colour-density relation at high redshift.

Contribution

It provides new insights into galaxy properties and their environmental dependence at z > 1.5 using deep near-infrared imaging from the GOODS NICMOS Survey.

Findings

Strong correlation between galaxy colour and stellar mass up to z~3

No significant correlation between colour and local density at high redshift

Possible reversal of the colour-density relation at the highest overdensities

Abstract

We present a study of the relationship between galaxy colour, stellar mass, and local galaxy density in a deep near-infrared imaging survey up to a redshift of z~3 using the GOODS NICMOS Survey (GNS). The GNS is a very deep, near-infrared Hubble Space Telescope survey imaging a total of 45 arcmin^2 in the GOODS fields, reaching a stellar mass completeness limit of M* = 10^9.5 M_sun at z=3. Using this data we measure galaxy local densities based on galaxy counts within a fixed aperture, as well as the distance to the 3rd, 5th and 7th nearest neighbour. We find a strong correlation between colour and stellar mass at all redshifts up to z~3. We do not find a strong correlation between colour and local density, however, the highest overdensities might be populated by a higher fraction of blue galaxies than average or underdense areas, indicating a possible reversal of the colour-density relation at high redshift. Our data suggests that the possible higher blue fraction at extreme overdensities might be due to a lack of massive red galaxies at the highest local densities.