Spectroscopic confirmation of a dust-obscured, metal-rich dwarf galaxy at z~5

TL;DR

This paper reports the spectroscopic confirmation of a dust-obscured, metal-rich dwarf galaxy at redshift approximately 4.88, revealing its high dust extinction, metallicity, and star formation activity, challenging existing galaxy evolution models.

Contribution

First spectroscopic confirmation of a dust-obscured, metal-rich dwarf galaxy at high redshift using JWST data, providing new insights into early galaxy properties.

Findings

Galaxy at z=4.883 confirmed via optical lines.

High dust extinction with Av=2.2-3.3.

Metal-rich with 12+log(O/H)>8.3.

Abstract

We present the first spectroscopic confirmation of a dust-obscured dwarf galaxy, CEERS-14821. The analysis is performed combining JWST NIRCam broad-band photometry and NIRSpec/PRISM spectroscopic data. From the detection of multiple rest-frame optical lines, we derive that CEERS-14821 is located at $z=4.883\pm0.003$. Moreover, from a secure detection of the $H_{\alpha}$ and $H_{\beta}$ we derived that the galaxy has a dust extinction ranging from Av=2.2 to Av=3.3, depending on the assumed reddening law. This value is extremely large given that we estimated a low stellar mass around log(M/Mo)=8.0-8.2. Moreover, using different metallicity tracers, we verify that the galaxy is also metal-rich, with 12+log(O/H)>8.3. This is well above the expectation from both the mass-metallicity relation and the fundamental mass-metalliticy relation. CEERS-14821 is going through a burst of star formation, there are no indications of a strong contribution from an active galactic nuclei (f(AGN)<0.5 with respect to the total dust luminosity). Based on the rest-frame optical images, this source has a size compatible with galaxies of similar stellar mass and redshift. Finally, with the current data, it seems that there are galaxies closely interacting with CEERS-14821.