Collaborative Research: "The Physical Properties of Lyman Alpha Emitters at 2<z<3"

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The awardees have performed a deep ground-based narrow-band survey for Lyman-alpha emitters (LAEs, possible progenitors of ordinary galaxies like the Milky Way) that has produced a sample of 259 galaxies, one of the largest sample of LAEs yet acquired. The funded work will extend the survey by 1) exploring the evolution of LAEs by studying a complementary sample at lower redshift; 2) measuring the 3-D distribution of the LAEs; 3) probing the stellar winds, dynamics, and HI column densities of LAEs via extensive high-resolution spectroscopy with the Robert Stobie Spectrograph on the South African Large Telescope (SALT) and the LDSS3 spectrograph on Magellan, and 4) performing near-infrared spectroscopy with FLAMINGOS-2 on Gemini-South to measure systemic redshifts and LAE metallicities. The research promises significant progress towards a complete picture of the birth and early growth of the precursors of present-day L* galaxies.Broader impacts of this work include research training for undergraduates, release of data to the astronomical community, and participation in the "Astrofest" activity of public lectures at Penn State.