The cosmic microwave background and the stellar initial mass function
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Publication Date
2018-08-06Journal Title
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
ISSN
0035-8711
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Volume
480
Issue
3
Pages
4265-4272
Type
Article
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Jermyn, A., Steinhardt, C., & Tout, C. (2018). The cosmic microwave background and the stellar initial mass function. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 480 (3), 4265-4272. https://doi.org/10.1093/MNRAS/STY2123
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 ≳ 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 SFRs for the highest redshift and highest SFR galaxies. In addition, this may resolve several outstanding problems in the chemical evolution of galactic haloes.
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/MNRAS/STY2123
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/287731
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