The rest-frame optical sizes of massive galaxies with suppressed star formation at $z\sim4$

TL;DR

This study measures the rest-frame optical sizes of massive quiescent galaxies at redshift around 4, revealing their compactness and size evolution, which suggests growth through minor dry mergers over cosmic time.

Contribution

First measurement of the rest-frame optical sizes of quiescent galaxies at z~4, demonstrating their small sizes and size evolution consistent with minor dry merger growth.

Findings

QGs at z~4 have effective radii of 0.2 to 1.8 kpc.

Stacked size of brightest QGs is 0.7 kpc.

Size evolution follows a specific power-law with cosmic time.

Abstract

We present the rest-frame optical sizes of massive quiescent galaxies (QGs) at $z\sim4$ measured at $K'$-band with the Infrared Camera and Spectrograph (IRCS) and AO188 on the Subaru telescope. Based on a deep multi-wavelength catalog in the Subaru XMM-Newton Deep Survey Field (SXDS), covering a wide wavelength range from the $u$-band to the IRAC $8.0\mu m$ over 0.7 deg$^2$, we evaluate photometric redshift to identify massive ($M_{\star}\sim10^{11}\ M_\odot$) galaxies with suppressed star formation. These galaxies show a prominent 4000$\rm \AA$ break feature at $z\sim4$, suggestive of an evolved stellar population. We then conduct follow-up $K'$-band imaging with adaptive optics for the five brightest galaxies ($K_{AB,total}=22.5\sim23.4$). Compared to lower redshift ones, QGs at $z\sim4$ have smaller physical sizes of effective radii $r_{eff}=0.2$ to $1.8$ kpc. The mean size measured by stacking the four brightest objects is $r_{eff}=0.7\rm\ kpc$. This is the first measurement of the rest-frame optical sizes of QGs at $z\sim4$. We evaluate the robustness of our size measurements using simulations and find that our size estimates are reasonably accurate with an expected systematic bias of $\sim0.2$ kpc. If we account for the stellar mass evolution, massive QGs at $z\sim4$ are likely to evolve into the most massive galaxies today. We find their size evolution with cosmic time in a form of $\log(r_e/{\rm kpc})= -0.44+1.77 \log(t/\rm Gyr)$. Their size growth is proportional to the square of stellar mass, indicating the size-stellar mass growth driven by minor dry mergers.