Explaining ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at $3 < z < 5$ in the context of their environments

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Main Authors: Jespersen, Christian K., Carnall, Adam C., Lovell, Christopher C.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Jespersen, Christian K.
Carnall, Adam C.
Lovell, Christopher C.
author_facet Jespersen, Christian K.
Carnall, Adam C.
Lovell, Christopher C.
contents The swift assembly of the earliest galaxies poses a significant challenge to our understanding of galaxy formation. Ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at intermediate redshifts ($3 < z < 5$) currently present one of the most pressing problems for theoretical modeling, since very few mechanisms can be invoked to explain how such galaxies formed so early in the history of the Universe. Here, we exploit the fact that these galaxies all reside within significant overdensities to explain their masses. To this end, we construct and release a modified version of the Extreme Value Statistics (EVS) code which takes into account galaxy environment by incorporating clustering in the calculation. With this new version of EVS, we find that ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at $3<z<5$ do not present as serious a tension with simple models of galaxy formation when the analysis of a given galaxy is conditioned on its environment.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_05340
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Explaining ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at $3 < z < 5$ in the context of their environments
Jespersen, Christian K.
Carnall, Adam C.
Lovell, Christopher C.
Astrophysics of Galaxies
Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
The swift assembly of the earliest galaxies poses a significant challenge to our understanding of galaxy formation. Ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at intermediate redshifts ($3 < z < 5$) currently present one of the most pressing problems for theoretical modeling, since very few mechanisms can be invoked to explain how such galaxies formed so early in the history of the Universe. Here, we exploit the fact that these galaxies all reside within significant overdensities to explain their masses. To this end, we construct and release a modified version of the Extreme Value Statistics (EVS) code which takes into account galaxy environment by incorporating clustering in the calculation. With this new version of EVS, we find that ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at $3<z<5$ do not present as serious a tension with simple models of galaxy formation when the analysis of a given galaxy is conditioned on its environment.
title Explaining ultra-massive quiescent galaxies at $3 < z < 5$ in the context of their environments
topic Astrophysics of Galaxies
Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.05340