Old galaxies in the young Universe

A. Cimatti (), E. Daddi, A. Renzini, P. Cassata, E. Vanzella, L. Pozzetti, S. Cristiani, A. Fontana, G. Rodighiero, M. Mignoli and G. Zamorani
Additional contact information
A. Cimatti: INAF - Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri
E. Daddi: European Southern Observatory
A. Renzini: European Southern Observatory
P. Cassata: Università di Padova
E. Vanzella: Università di Padova
L. Pozzetti: INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna
S. Cristiani: INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste
A. Fontana: INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma
G. Rodighiero: Università di Padova
M. Mignoli: INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna
G. Zamorani: INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna

Nature, 2004, vol. 430, issue 6996, 184-187

Abstract: Abstract More than half of all stars in the local Universe are found in massive spheroidal galaxies1, which are characterized by old stellar populations2,3 with little or no current star formation. In present models, such galaxies appear rather late in the history of the Universe as the culmination of a hierarchical merging process, in which larger galaxies are assembled through mergers of smaller precursor galaxies. But observations have not yet established how, or even when, the massive spheroidals formed2,3, nor if their seemingly sudden appearance when the Universe was about half its present age (at redshift z ≈ 1) results from a real evolutionary effect (such as a peak of mergers) or from the observational difficulty of identifying them at earlier epochs. Here we report the spectroscopic and morphological identification of four old, fully assembled, massive (1011 solar masses) spheroidal galaxies at l.6

Date: 2004
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DOI: 10.1038/nature02668

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