---
_id: '11500'
abstract:
- lang: eng
text: We report the discovery of diffuse extended Lyα emission from redshift 3.1
to 4.5, tracing cosmic web filaments on scales of 2.5−4 cMpc. These structures
have been observed in overdensities of Lyα emitters in the MUSE Extremely Deep
Field, a 140 h deep MUSE observation located in the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field. Among
the 22 overdense regions identified, five are likely to harbor very extended Lyα
emission at high significance with an average surface brightness of 5 × 10−20
erg s−1 cm−2 arcsec−2. Remarkably, 70% of the total Lyα luminosity from these
filaments comes from beyond the circumgalactic medium of any identified Lyα emitter.
Fluorescent Lyα emission powered by the cosmic UV background can only account
for less than 34% of this emission at z ≈ 3 and for not more than 10% at higher
redshift. We find that the bulk of this diffuse emission can be reproduced by
the unresolved Lyα emission of a large population of ultra low-luminosity Lyα
emitters (< 1040 erg s−1), provided that the faint end of the Lyα luminosity function
is steep (α ⪅ −1.8), it extends down to luminosities lower than 1038 − 1037 erg
s−1, and the clustering of these Lyα emitters is significant (filling factor <
1/6). If these Lyα emitters are powered by star formation, then this implies their
luminosity function needs to extend down to star formation rates < 10−4 M⊙ yr−1.
These observations provide the first detection of the cosmic web in Lyα emission
in typical filamentary environments and the first observational clue indicating
the existence of a large population of ultra low-luminosity Lyα emitters at high
redshift.
acknowledgement: 'We warmly thank ESO Paranal staff for their great professional support
during all MXDF GTO observing runs. We thank the anonymous referee for a careful
reading of the manuscript and helpful comments. We also thank Matthew Lehnert for
fruitful discussions. RB, AF, SC acknowledge support from the ERC advanced grant
339659-MUSICOS. JB acknowledges support by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
(FCT) through the research grants UID/FIS/04434/2019, UIDB/04434/2020, UIDP/04434/2020
and through the Investigador FCT Contract No. IF/01654/2014/CP1215/CT0003. TG, AV
acknowledges support from the European Research Council under grant agreement ERC-stg-757258
(TRIPLE). DM acknowledges A. Dabbech for useful interactions about IUWT and support
from the GDR ISIS through the Projets exploratoires program (project TASTY). AF
acknowledges the support from grant PRIN MIUR2017-20173ML3WW_001. SLZ acknowledges
support by The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) through a
TOP Grant Module 1 under project number 614.001.652. This research made use of the
following open-source software and we are thankful to the developers of these: GNU
Octave (Eaton et al. 2018) and its statistics, signal and image packages, the Python
packages Matplotlib (Hunter 2007), Numpy (van der Walt et al. 2010), MPDAF (Piqueras
et al. 2017), Astropy (Astropy Collaboration 2018), PyWavelets (Lee et al. 2019).'
article_number: A107
article_processing_charge: No
article_type: original
arxiv: 1
author:
- first_name: R.
full_name: Bacon, R.
last_name: Bacon
- first_name: D.
full_name: Mary, D.
last_name: Mary
- first_name: T.
full_name: Garel, T.
last_name: Garel
- first_name: J.
full_name: Blaizot, J.
last_name: Blaizot
- first_name: M.
full_name: Maseda, M.
last_name: Maseda
- first_name: J.
full_name: Schaye, J.
last_name: Schaye
- first_name: L.
full_name: Wisotzki, L.
last_name: Wisotzki
- first_name: S.
full_name: Conseil, S.
last_name: Conseil
- first_name: J.
full_name: Brinchmann, J.
last_name: Brinchmann
- first_name: F.
full_name: Leclercq, F.
last_name: Leclercq
- first_name: V.
full_name: Abril-Melgarejo, V.
last_name: Abril-Melgarejo
- first_name: L.
full_name: Boogaard, L.
last_name: Boogaard
- first_name: N. F.
full_name: Bouché, N. F.
last_name: Bouché
- first_name: T.
full_name: Contini, T.
last_name: Contini
- first_name: A.
full_name: Feltre, A.
last_name: Feltre
- first_name: B.
full_name: Guiderdoni, B.
last_name: Guiderdoni
- first_name: C.
full_name: Herenz, C.
last_name: Herenz
- first_name: W.
full_name: Kollatschny, W.
last_name: Kollatschny
- first_name: H.
full_name: Kusakabe, H.
last_name: Kusakabe
- first_name: Jorryt J
full_name: Matthee, Jorryt J
id: 7439a258-f3c0-11ec-9501-9df22fe06720
last_name: Matthee
orcid: 0000-0003-2871-127X
- first_name: L.
full_name: Michel-Dansac, L.
last_name: Michel-Dansac
- first_name: T.
full_name: Nanayakkara, T.
last_name: Nanayakkara
- first_name: J.
full_name: Richard, J.
last_name: Richard
- first_name: M.
full_name: Roth, M.
last_name: Roth
- first_name: K. B.
full_name: Schmidt, K. B.
last_name: Schmidt
- first_name: M.
full_name: Steinmetz, M.
last_name: Steinmetz
- first_name: L.
full_name: Tresse, L.
last_name: Tresse
- first_name: T.
full_name: Urrutia, T.
last_name: Urrutia
- first_name: A.
full_name: Verhamme, A.
last_name: Verhamme
- first_name: P. M.
full_name: Weilbacher, P. M.
last_name: Weilbacher
- first_name: J.
full_name: Zabl, J.
last_name: Zabl
- first_name: S. L.
full_name: Zoutendijk, S. L.
last_name: Zoutendijk
citation:
ama: 'Bacon R, Mary D, Garel T, et al. The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The cosmic
web in emission at high redshift. Astronomy & Astrophysics. 2021;647.
doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202039887'
apa: 'Bacon, R., Mary, D., Garel, T., Blaizot, J., Maseda, M., Schaye, J., … Zoutendijk,
S. L. (2021). The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The cosmic web in emission at high
redshift. Astronomy & Astrophysics. EDP Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202039887'
chicago: 'Bacon, R., D. Mary, T. Garel, J. Blaizot, M. Maseda, J. Schaye, L. Wisotzki,
et al. “The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The Cosmic Web in Emission at High Redshift.”
Astronomy & Astrophysics. EDP Sciences, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202039887.'
ieee: 'R. Bacon et al., “The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The cosmic web in
emission at high redshift,” Astronomy & Astrophysics, vol. 647. EDP
Sciences, 2021.'
ista: 'Bacon R, Mary D, Garel T, Blaizot J, Maseda M, Schaye J, Wisotzki L, Conseil
S, Brinchmann J, Leclercq F, Abril-Melgarejo V, Boogaard L, Bouché NF, Contini
T, Feltre A, Guiderdoni B, Herenz C, Kollatschny W, Kusakabe H, Matthee JJ, Michel-Dansac
L, Nanayakkara T, Richard J, Roth M, Schmidt KB, Steinmetz M, Tresse L, Urrutia
T, Verhamme A, Weilbacher PM, Zabl J, Zoutendijk SL. 2021. The MUSE Extremely
Deep Field: The cosmic web in emission at high redshift. Astronomy & Astrophysics.
647, A107.'
mla: 'Bacon, R., et al. “The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The Cosmic Web in Emission
at High Redshift.” Astronomy & Astrophysics, vol. 647, A107, EDP Sciences,
2021, doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202039887.'
short: R. Bacon, D. Mary, T. Garel, J. Blaizot, M. Maseda, J. Schaye, L. Wisotzki,
S. Conseil, J. Brinchmann, F. Leclercq, V. Abril-Melgarejo, L. Boogaard, N.F.
Bouché, T. Contini, A. Feltre, B. Guiderdoni, C. Herenz, W. Kollatschny, H. Kusakabe,
J.J. Matthee, L. Michel-Dansac, T. Nanayakkara, J. Richard, M. Roth, K.B. Schmidt,
M. Steinmetz, L. Tresse, T. Urrutia, A. Verhamme, P.M. Weilbacher, J. Zabl, S.L.
Zoutendijk, Astronomy & Astrophysics 647 (2021).
date_created: 2022-07-06T09:31:50Z
date_published: 2021-03-18T00:00:00Z
date_updated: 2022-07-19T09:34:57Z
day: '18'
doi: 10.1051/0004-6361/202039887
extern: '1'
external_id:
arxiv:
- '2102.05516'
intvolume: ' 647'
keyword:
- Space and Planetary Science
- Astronomy and Astrophysics
- 'galaxies: high-redshift / galaxies: groups: general / cosmology: observations'
language:
- iso: eng
main_file_link:
- open_access: '1'
url: https://arxiv.org/abs/2102.05516
month: '03'
oa: 1
oa_version: Published Version
publication: Astronomy & Astrophysics
publication_identifier:
eissn:
- 1432-0746
issn:
- 0004-6361
publication_status: published
publisher: EDP Sciences
quality_controlled: '1'
scopus_import: '1'
status: public
title: 'The MUSE Extremely Deep Field: The cosmic web in emission at high redshift'
type: journal_article
user_id: 2DF688A6-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
volume: 647
year: '2021'
...