The evolution of the [OII], H{\beta} and [OIII] emission-line luminosity functions over the last nine billions years

TL;DR

This study measures how the luminosity functions of key emission lines in galaxies have evolved over the last nine billion years, providing new insights into galaxy properties and large-scale structure for future surveys.

Contribution

It presents the first measurement of the Hβ luminosity function at these redshifts and models the evolution of multiple emission-line luminosity functions using extensive spectroscopic data.

Findings

Luminosity and density of emission-line galaxies increase with redshift.

Characteristic luminosity L* for [OII], Hβ, and [OIII] increases significantly over the studied redshift range.

First measurement of Hβ luminosity function at these redshifts.

Abstract

Emission line galaxies are one of the main tracers of the large-scale structure to be targeted by the next-generation dark energy surveys. To provide a better understanding of the properties and statistics of these galaxies, we have collected spectroscopic data from the VVDS and DEEP2 deep surveys and estimated the galaxy luminosity functions (LFs) of three distinct emission lines, [OII] ($0.5 < z < 1.3$), H{\beta} ($0.3 < z < 0.8$) and [OIII] ($0.3 < z < 0.8$). Our measurements are based on 35,639 emission line galaxies and cover a volume of $\sim10^7$Mpc$^3$. We present the first measurement of the H{\beta} LF at these redshifts. We have also compiled LFs from the literature that were based on independent data or covered different redshift ranges, and we fit the entire set over the whole redshift range with analytic Schechter and Saunders models, assuming a natural redshift dependence of the parameters. We find that the characteristic luminosity ($L_*$) and density ($\phi_*$) of all LFs increase with redshift. Using the Schechter model over the redshift ranges considered, we find that, for [OII] emitters, the characteristic luminosity $L_*(z=0.5)=3.2\times10^{41}$ erg/s increases by a factor of $2.7 \pm 0.2$ from z=0.5 to 1.3; for H{\beta} emitters $L_*(z=0.3)=1.3\times10^{41}$ erg/s increases by a factor of $2.0 \pm 0.2$ from z=0.3 to 0.8; and for [OIII] emitters $L_*(z=0.3)=7.3\times10^{41}$ erg/s increases by a factor of $3.5 \pm 0.4$ from z=0.3 to 0.8.