Noema formIng Cluster survEy (NICE): A census of star formation and cold gas properties in massive protoclusters at 1.5 < <i>z</i> < 4
Massive protoclusters at z ∼ 1.5 − 4, the peak of the cosmic star formation history, are key to understanding the formation mechanisms of massive galaxies in today’s clusters. However, studies of protoclusters at these high redshifts remain limited, primarily due to small sample sizes and heterogeneous selection criteria. For this work, we conducted a systematic investigation of the star formation and cold gas properties of member galaxies of eight massive protoclusters in the COSMOS field, using the statistical and homogeneously selected sample from the Noema formIng Cluster survEy (NICE). Our analysis reveals a steep increase in the star formation rates per halo mass (Σ SFR / M halo ) with redshifts in these intensively star-forming protoclusters, reaching values one to two orders of magnitude higher than those observed in the field at z > 2. We further show that instead of an enhancement of starbursts, this increase is largely driven by the concentration of massive and gas-rich star-forming galaxies in the protocluster cores. The member galaxies still generally follow the same star-forming main sequence as in the field, with a moderate enhancement at the low-mass end. Notably, the most massive protocluster galaxies ( M ⋆ > 8×10 10 M ⊙ ) exhibit higher μ gas and τ gas than their field counterparts, while remaining on the star-forming main sequence. These gas-rich, massive, and star-forming galaxies are predominantly concentrated in the protocluster cores and are likely progenitors of massive ellipticals in the center of today’s clusters. These results suggest that the formation of massive galaxies in such environments is sustained by substantial gas reservoirs, which in turn support persistent star formation and drive early mass assembly in forming cluster cores.
Authors
- Carlos Gómez-Guijarro (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4085-9165)
- Francesco Valentino (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6477-4011)
- Aurélien Henry (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9466-2763)
- Zhiyuan Ji (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7673-2257)
- Qiusheng Gu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3890-3729)
- Y. Sophia Dai (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7928-416X)
- Ke Xu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1935-8910)
- Qinghua Tan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3032-0948)
- D. Elbaz (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7631-647X)
- Shuowen Jin
- A. Finoguenov (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4606-5403)
- G. J. Elias
- Nikolaj B. Sillassen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4517-3998)
- Jiasheng Huang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6511-8745)
- R. T. Coogan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4343-0479)
- V. Strazzullo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7975-2894)
- F. Gao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2944-8672)
- Shiying Lu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5988-2202)
- R. Michael Rich (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0427-8387)
- Eva Schinnerer (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3933-7677)
- Hanwen Sun (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0007-0241-0213)
- Chiara D’Eugenio (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7344-3126)
- V. Arumugam (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0009-7284-5049)
- Emanuele Daddi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3331-9590)
- B. Magnelli (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6777-6490)
- Luwenjia Zhou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1687-9665)
- Mengyuan Xiao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1207-5344)
- Daizhong Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9773-7479)
- Tao Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4200-3712)
- S. Guo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3430-7361)
- Yijun Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1010-7763)
- Qiaoyang Hao
- R. Gobat (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9566-1922)
- I. Delvecchio (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8706-2252)
- Zhiyu Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8992-1647)
- Tiancheng Yang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0008-4971-035X)
- Yong Shi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7974-1079)
- G. Magdis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4872-2294)
- Yanmei Chen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3226-031X)
Institutions
- University of Geneva (CH)
- University of Copenhagen (DK)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso (CL)
- European Southern Observatory (DE)
- University of Helsinki (FI)
- University of Arizona (US)
- Universidad de La Laguna (ES)
- University of California, Los Angeles (US)
- Délégation Paris 7 (FR)
- Université Paris Cité (FR)
- Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives (FR)
- Université Paris-Saclay (FR)
- Trieste Astronomical Observatory (IT)
- Purple Mountain Observatory (CN)
- Astrophysique, Instrumentation et Modélisation (FR)
- Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (DE)
- CEA Paris-Saclay (FR)
- Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (ES)
- Institute for Fundamental Physics of the Universe (IT)
- Ausonius Institut de Recherche sur l'Antiquité et le Moyen age (FR)
- National Astronomical Observatories (CN)
- Osservatorio di Astrofisica e Scienza dello Spazio
- Anqing Normal University (CN)
- Nanjing University (CN)
- Technical University of Denmark (DK)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Astronomy and Astrophysics
- Published
- 2025-08-04
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202553996
- Primary Topic
- Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Danmarks Grundforskningsfond
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province
- National Key Research and Development Program of China