Statistical correlation between the distribution of Ly$\alpha$ emitters and IGM HI at $z\sim2.2$ mapped by Subaru/Hyper Suprime-Cam

TL;DR

This study investigates the correlation between Ly$ ext{alpha}$ emitters and intergalactic HI at redshift 2.2, revealing significant clustering and correlation on scales from hundreds of kiloparsecs to a few megaparsecs.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed statistical analysis of the spatial correlation between LAEs and IGM HI at $z\, ext{sim}\,2.2$ using Subaru/HSC imaging and SDSS/eBOSS quasar data.

Findings

LAEs tend to cluster in HI-rich regions.

A significant correlation exists between LAE overdensity and IGM optical depth.

Evidence of dense HI in circumgalactic and intergalactic media around LAEs.

Abstract

The correlation between neutral Hydrogen (HI) in the intergalactic medium (IGM) and galaxies now attracts great interests. We select four fields which include several coherently strong Ly$\alpha$ absorption systems at $z\sim2.2$ detected by using background quasars from the whole SDSS/(e)BOSS database. Deep narrow-band and $g$-band imaging are performed using the Hyper Suprime-Cam on the Subaru Telescope. We select out 2,642 Ly$\alpha$ emitter (LAE) candidates at $z=2.177\pm0.023$ down to the Ly$\alpha$ luminosity of $L_{\text{Ly}\alpha}\approx 2 \times 10^{42} {\rm erg~s}^{-1}$ to construct the galaxy overdensity maps, covering an effective area of 5.39 deg$^2$. Combining the sample with the Ly$\alpha$ absorption estimated from 64 (e)BOSS quasar spectra, we find a moderate to strong correlation between the LAE overdensity $\delta_{\rm LAE}$ and the effective optical depth $\tau_{\rm LoS}$ in line-of-sights, with $P$-value$=0.09\%$ ($<0.01\%$) when the field that contains a significant quasar overdensity is in(ex)cluded. The cross-correlation analysis also clearly suggests that up to $4\pm1$ pMpc, LAEs tend to cluster in the regions rich in HI gas, indicated by the high $\tau_{\rm LoS}$, and avoid the low $\tau_{\rm LoS}$ region where the HI gas is deficient. By averaging the $\tau_{\rm LoS}$ as a function of the projected distance ($d$) to LAEs, we find a $30\%$ excess signal at $2\sigma$ level at $d<200$ pkpc, indicating the dense HI in circumgalactic medium, and a tentative excess at $400<d<600$ pkpc in IGM regime, corroborating the cross-correlation signal detected at about $0.5$ pMpc. These statistical analyses indicate that galaxy$-$IGM HI correlations exist on scales ranging from several hundred pkpc to several pMpc at $z\sim2.2$.