JADES: Differing assembly histories of galaxies: Observational evidence for bursty star formation histories and (mini-)quenching in the first billion years of the Universe

Looser, TJ ORCID: 0000-0002-3642-2446, D'Eugenio, F, Maiolino, R ORCID: 0000-0002-4985-3819, Tacchella, S, Curti, M, Arribas, S, Baker, WM, Baum, S ORCID: 0000-0002-4735-8224, Bonaventura, N, Boyett, K, Bunker, AJ, Carniani, S ORCID: 0000-0002-6719-380X, Charlot, S ORCID: 0000-0003-3458-2275, Chevallard, J, Curtis-Lake, E, Lola Danhaive, A, Eisenstein, DJ, De Graaff, A, Hainline, K, Ji, Z et al (2025) JADES: Differing assembly histories of galaxies: Observational evidence for bursty star formation histories and (mini-)quenching in the first billion years of the Universe. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 697. ISSN 0004-6361

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Abstract

We used deep NIRSpec spectroscopic data from the JADES survey to derive the star formation histories (SFHs) of a sample of 200 galaxies at 0.6 < z < 11 that span stellar masses from 106 to 109:5 M⊙. We found that galaxies at high redshift, galaxies above the main sequence (MS), and low-mass galaxies tend to host younger stellar populations than their lower-redshift, below the MS, and more massive counterparts. Interestingly, the correlation between age, stellar massM*, and star formation rate (SFR) existed even earlier than cosmic noon, out to the earliest cosmic epochs. However, these trends have a large scatter. There are also examples of young stellar populations below the MS, which indicates recent (bursty) star formation in evolved systems. We further explored the burstiness of the SFHs by using the ratio of the SFR averaged over the last 10 Myr and averaged between 10 Myr and 100 Myr before the epoch of observation (SFRcont;10/SFRcont;90). We found that high-redshift and low-mass galaxies have particularly bursty SFHs, while more massive and lower-redshift systems evolve more steadily. We also present the discovery of another (mini-)quenched galaxy at z = 4:4, which might be only temporarily quiescent as a consequence of the extremely bursty evolution. Finally, we also found a steady decline in the dust reddening of the stellar population as the earliest cosmic epochs are approached, although some dust reddening is still observed in some of the highest-redshift and most strongly star-forming systems.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	5109 Space Sciences; 51 Physical Sciences; 0201 Astronomical and Space Sciences; Astronomy & Astrophysics; 5101 Astronomical sciences; 5107 Particle and high energy physics; 5109 Space sciences
Subjects:	Q Science > QB Astronomy Q Science > QC Physics
Divisions:	Astrophysics Research Institute
Publisher:	EDP Sciences
Date of acceptance:	22 December 2024
Date of first compliant Open Access:	2 July 2025
Date Deposited:	02 Jul 2025 15:25
Last Modified:	03 Jul 2025 12:45
DOI or ID number:	10.1051/0004-6361/202347102
URI:	https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/26699

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