Deep Rest-UV JWST/NIRSpec Spectroscopy of Early Galaxies: The Demographics of C <scp>iv</scp> and N-emitters in the Reionization Era

Abstract JWST has recently discovered a subset of reionization era galaxies with ionized gas that is metal-poor in oxygen and carbon but heavily enriched in nitrogen. This abundance pattern is almost never seen in lower-redshift galaxies but is commonly observed in globular cluster stars. We have recently demonstrated that this peculiar abundance pattern appears in a compact (≃20 pc) metal-poor galaxy undergoing a strong burst of star formation. This galaxy was originally selected based on strong C iv emission, indicating a hard radiation field rarely seen locally. In this paper, we present JWST/NIRSpec observations of another reionization-era galaxy known to power strong C iv emission, the z = 7.04 gravitationally lensed galaxy A1703-zd6. The emission-line spectrum reveals this is a metal-poor galaxy ( <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mn>12</mml:mn> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mi>log</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">(</mml:mo> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">O</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">H</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">)</mml:mo> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mn>7.47</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.19</mml:mn> </mml:math> ) dominated by a young stellar population ( <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mn>1</mml:mn> <mml:mo>.</mml:mo> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>6</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.4</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.5</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> Myr) that powers a very hard ionizing spectrum (C iv equivalent width, EW = 19.4 Å, He ii EW = 2.2 Å). The interstellar medium is highly enriched in nitrogen ( <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mi>log</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">(</mml:mo> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">N</mml:mi> <mml:mo>/</mml:mo> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">O</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">)</mml:mo> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.6</mml:mn> </mml:math> ) with very high electron densities (8–19 × 10 4 cm −3 ) and extreme ionization conditions rarely seen at lower redshift. We also find intense CIV emission (EW ≳ 20 Å) in two new z ≳ 6 metal-poor galaxies. To put these results in context, we search for UV line emission in a sample of 737 z ≳ 4 galaxies with NIRSpec spectra, establishing that 40%(30%) of systems with [O iii ]+H β EW &gt; 2000 Å have N iv ] (C iv ) detections with EW &gt; 5 Å(&gt; 10 Å). These results suggest high N/O ratios, and hard ionizing sources appear in a brief phase following a burst of star formation in compact high-density stellar complexes.