Lyman break and UV-selected galaxies at z ~ 1: II. PACS-100um/160um FIR detections

TL;DR

This study detects and analyzes 42 Lyman break galaxies at z ~ 1 in the FIR, revealing their dust content, star formation, and morphological properties, and comparing their evolution with higher redshift counterparts.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed FIR detection and analysis of LBGs at z ~ 1, highlighting their dust, star formation, and morphological characteristics in the context of galaxy evolution.

Findings

PACS-detected LBGs are larger, more massive, dustier, and UV-brighter than undetected ones.

All PACS-detected LBGs at z ~ 1 are LIRGs, but none are ULIRGs, indicating evolution with cosmic time.

Dust attenuation estimates from UV slope are effective for total SFR at z ~ 1, but overestimate for younger galaxies.

Abstract

We report the PACS-100um/160um detections of a sample of 42 GALEX-selected and FIR-detected Lyman break galaxies (LBGs) at z ~ 1 located in the COSMOS field and analyze their ultra-violet (UV) to far-infrared (FIR) properties. The detection of these LBGs in the FIR indicates that they have a dust content high enough so that its emission can be directly detected. According to a spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting with stellar population templates to their UV-to-near-IR observed photometry, PACS-detected LBGs tend to be bigger, more massive, dustier, redder in the UV continuum, and UV-brighter than PACS-undetected LBGs. PACS-detected LBGs at z ~ 1 are mostly disk-like galaxies and are located over the green-valley and red sequence of the color-magnitude diagram of galaxies at their redshift. By using their UV and IR emission, we find that PACS-detected LBGs tend to be less dusty and have slightly higher total star-formation rates (SFRs) than other PACS-detected UV-selected galaxies within their same redshift range. As a consequence of the selection effect due to the depth of the FIR observations employed, all our PACS-detected LBGs are LIRGs. However, none of them are in the ULIRG regime, where the FIR observations are complete. The finding of ULIRGs-LBGs at higher redshifts suggests an evolution of the FIR emission of LBGs with cosmic time. In an IRX-$\beta$ diagram, PACS-detected LBGs at z ~ 1 tend to be located around the relation for local starburst similarly to other UV-selected PACS-detected galaxies at their same redshift. Consequently, the dust-correction factors obtained with their UV continuum slope allow to determine their total SFR, unlike at higher redshifts. However, the dust attenuation derived from UV to NIR SED fitting overestimates the total SFR for most of our PACS-detected LBGs in age-dependent way: the overestimation factor is higher in younger galaxies.