The cosmic microwave background and the stellar initial mass function

descriptionPublicationkeyboard_double_arrow_right Article , Preprint 06 Aug 2018Embargo end date: 01 Jan 2018 United Kingdom, Denmark English Publisher:Oxford University Press (OUP)Journal:Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, volume 480, pages 4,265-4,272 (issn: 0035-8711, eissn: 1365-2966,

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Authors: Adam S Jermyn; Charles L Steinhardt; Christopher A Tout;

doi: 10.1093/mnras/sty2123 , 10.48550/arxiv.1809.03502 , 10.17863/cam.35046

arXiv: 1809.03502

The cosmic microwave background and the stellar initial mass function

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Abstract

We argue that an increased temperature in star-forming clouds alters the stellar initial mass function to be more bottom-light than in the Milky Way. At redshifts $z \gtrsim 6$, heating from the cosmic microwave background radiation produces this effect in all galaxies, and it is also present at lower redshifts in galaxies with very high star formation rates (SFRs). A failure to account for it means that at present, photometric template fitting likely overestimates stellar masses and star formation rates for the highest-redshift and highest-SFR galaxies. In addition this may resolve several outstanding problems in the chemical evolution of galactic halos.

9 pages, 5 figures. Published in MNRAS. Added further references

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United Kingdom, Denmark

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Keywords

FOS: Physical sciences, cosmic background radiation, Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies, galaxies: luminosity function, mass function, 5101 Astronomical Sciences, galaxies: star formation, Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA), galaxies: stellar content, cosmological parameters, 51 Physical Sciences

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