Gemini South. The stellar supercluster, identified as the nucleus and kinematic center of
molecular gas rotation, is almost coincident
with the symmetry center of the galaxy’s inner bar. This infrared core (IRC) is also the primary source of the starburst-driven outflow.
Both the IRC and the nuclear disk are offset
with respect to the galaxy’s stellar bulge,
which implies that the central gas reservoir
and new star formation are decoupled from
older Galactic structure.
The complete results are published in The Astrophysical Journal, and more information
with detailed images is posted on the Gemini
website.
Discovery of a z ~ 6 Quasar:
Rethinking Reioniation Sources
in the Early Universe
Korea’s first result as a limited Gemini partner,
the discovery of a faint quasar at a redshift of
z ~ 6, sheds new light on the sources of reionization energy about a billion years after the
Big Bang.
Figure 2.
This GMOS-S spectrum
of the newly-discovered
z~6 quasar confirms its
identity and redshift.
Ionizing the neutral atoms of the intergalactic
medium requires significant sources of energy, from either galaxies’ stars or their accreting central black holes (as quasars). The new
discovery, however, ultimately suggests that
quasars do not contribute significantly.
In this work, the team began with the Infrared
Medium-Deep Survey, based on data from
Maunakea telescopes including the United
Kingdom Infrared Telescope and the CanadaFrance-Hawai‘i Telescope. Color selection revealed high-redshift quasar candidates, and
observations of this newly-discovered quasar
using the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph
on Gemini South confirm its redshift and
identity spectroscopically (Figure 2).
This single source and six additional candidates from the same survey are consistent
with limited contributions to reionization
from the faint end of the quasar luminosity
function; thus, 90% or more of the ionizing
flux must come from other sources.
This is the first Korean publication as part
of the Gemini Partnership, and was led by
Yongjung Kim (Seoul National University),
Myungshin Im (Principal Investigator; Seoul
National University), and colleagues. A translation of the Korean press release is posted on
the Gemini website, and the full publication
appears in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
A Massive Black Hole in a
Possible Relic Galaxy
New results based on Gemini observations
of the compact, early-type galaxy NGC 1277
yield a new, lower than previously determined, mass of its central supermassive black
hole. The work also has more profound implications for galaxy formation, suggesting that
massive black holes were formed before stars
came into place.
Jonelle Walsh (Texas A&M University) and
collaborators used the Near-infrared Integral
Field Spectrometer (NIFS) and laser-assisted
adaptive optics on the Gemini North telescope
to obtain high-resolution observations within
about 1,400 light years of NGC 1277’s center.
These provide both sensitive data within the
black hole sphere of influence and simultaneously cover extended regions where stars are
22
GeminiFocus
2015 Year in Review
January 2016