Characterizing Circumgalactic Gas around Massive Ellipticals at z~0.4 - II. Physical Properties and Elemental Abundances

TL;DR

This study investigates the physical properties and elemental abundances of the circumgalactic medium around massive elliptical galaxies at z~0.4, revealing a complex, multiphase, and poorly mixed cool gas component with significant mass.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed ionization and abundance analysis of the CGM around intermediate-redshift luminous red galaxies, highlighting the multiphase structure and mass estimates of cool gas.

Findings

Cool gas metallicity varies by over a factor of ten within halos.

Approximately 50% of halos contain metal-poor (<1/10 solar) gas.

Total cool gas mass within 160 kpc is about 1-2 x 10^10 solar masses.

Abstract

We present a systematic investigation of the circumgalactic medium (CGM) within projected distances d<160 kpc of luminous red galaxies (LRGs). The sample comprises 16 intermediate-redshift (z=0.21-0.55) LRGs of stellar mass M_star>1e11 M_sun. Combining far-ultraviolet Cosmic Origin Spectrograph spectra from the Hubble Space Telescope and optical echelle spectra from the ground enables a detailed ionization analysis based on resolved component structures of a suite of absorption transitions, including the full HI Lyman series and various ionic metal transitions. By comparing the relative abundances of different ions in individually-matched components, we show that cool gas (T~1e4 K) density and metallicity can vary by more than a factor of ten in in an LRG halo. Specifically, metal-poor absorbing components with <1/10 solar metallicity are seen in 50% of the LRG halos, while gas with solar and super-solar metallicity is also common. These results indicate a complex multiphase structure and poor chemical mixing in these quiescent halos. We calculate the total surface mass density of cool gas, \Sigma_cool, by applying the estimated ionization fraction corrections to the observed HI column densities. The radial profile of \Sigma_cool is best-described by a projected Einasto profile of slope \alpha=1 and scale radius r_s=48 kpc. We find that typical LRGs at z~0.4 contain cool gas mass of M_cool= (1-2) x1e10 M_sun at d<160 kpc (or as much as 4x1e10 M_sun at d<500 kpc), comparable to the cool CGM mass of star-forming galaxies. Furthermore, we show that high-ionization OVI and low-ionization absorption species exhibit distinct velocity profiles, highlighting their different physical origins. We discuss the implications of our findings for the origin and fate of cool gas in LRG halos.