1996/12/17 by Piero Madau · 4 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1063/1.52821
10 pages, 3 figures, LaTeX with AIP "aipproc" style file. Review Presented at the 1996 7th Annual October Astrophysics Conference in Maryland, ``Star Formation Near and Far''
arxiv created 1996/12/17 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01
I review some recent progress made in our understanding of galaxy evolution and the cosmic history of star formation. Like bookends, the results obtained from deep ground-based spectroscopy and from the Hubble Deep Field imaging survey put brackets around the intermediate redshift interval, 1<z<2, where starbirth probably peaked at a rate 10 times higher than today. The steady decline observed since z∼ 1 is largely associated with late-type galaxies. At z\gtrsim 2.5, the Lyman-break selected objects may represent the precursors of present-day spheroids, but appear, on average, quite underluminous relative to the expectations of the standard early-and-rapidly forming picture for spheroidal systems. The observed ultraviolet light density accounts for the bulk of the metals seen today in ``normal'' massive galaxies.