Large molecular gas reservoirs in ancestors of Milky Way-mass galaxies nine billion years ago
- Papovich, C
- Labbe, I
- Glazebrook, K
- Quadri, R
- Bekiaris, G
- Dickinson, M
- Finkelstein, SL
- Fisher, D
- Inami, H
- Livermore, RC
- Spitler, L
- Straatman, Caroline
- Tran, K-V
DOIAbstract
The gas accretion and star formation histories of galaxies like the Milky Way remain an outstanding problem in astrophysics(1,2). Observations show that 8 billion years ago, the progenitors to Milky Way-mass galaxies were forming stars 30 times faster than today and were predicted to be rich in molecular gas(3), in contrast to the low present-day gas fractions (<10%)(4-6). Here we show the detection of molecular gas from the CO (J = 3-2) emission (rest-frame 345.8 GHz) in galaxies at redshifts z = 1.2-1.3, selected to have the stellar mass and star formation rate of the progenitors of today's Milky Way-mass galaxies. The CO emission reveals large molecular gas masses, comparable to or exceeding the galaxy stellar masses, and implying that m...
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