Departmental Colloquium

New Observational Constraints of the Star Formation Rate at Redshift 10

Prof. Richard Ellis
Caltech

Time
Wed. October 18, 2006     3:30 PM     Stirling A

Abstract

Recent progress in conducting the census of luminous star forming galaxies at redshifts z>5 has suggested a marked decline with look-back time in their number. This conclusion seems at variance with the presence of fairly massive and mature stellar populations seen at z~5-6 and the UV photon density necessary for cosmic reionization. One possible explanation is the rapid build up of these mature galaxies from a large, as yet, undetected population of much lower luminosity systems at earlier times. Strong gravitational lensing offers possibly the only immediate way to locate such an intrinsically faint population. I will describe current Keck/HST/SST surveys ongoing to detect such systems at z~8-10 and the implications of the results obtained so far.

Refreshments will be available 15 mins before the talk.

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