text:
# Pairwise velocity dispersion of galaxies at high redshift: theoretical predictions

## 1 Introduction

The Lyman break technique developed by Steidel and his coworkers has opened a window to uncover high-redshift galaxies at redshift $`z3`$ based on ground-based photometric observations only (Steidel et al. 1996; Steidel et al. 1999). The technique has proved to be very efficient, since most of the candidates identified with photometric colors have been confirmed as high-redshift galaxies in subsequent spectroscopic observations. About 1000 Lyman-break galaxies with redshifts have already been compiled by Steidel’s group. The sample of high-redshift galaxies is likely to be enlarged significantly in the next years with more 10-meter telescopes being used in the observations (e.g. Ouchi et al. 2001).

Lyman-break galaxies have been found to be strongly clustered. The correlation length of the galaxies is $`3`$ to $`6h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ in comoving coordinates, similar to that of local normal galaxies (Steidel et al. 1998; Adelberger et al. 1998; Giavalisco et al. 1998; Connolly, Szalay & Brunner 1998; Arnouts et al.1999; Adelberger & Steidel 2000; Giavalisco & Dickinson 2001, hereafter GD01). The strong clustering is generally expected in cold dark matter (CDM) models if the galaxies are hosted by massive halos with mass $`M\stackrel{>}{}5\times 10^{11}h^1M_{}`$ (Mo & Fukugita 1996; Steidel et al. 1998; Jing & Suto 1998; Giavalisco et al. 1998; Adelberger et al. 1998; Connolly, Szalay & Brunner 1998). Combined with other observations of Lyman Break galaxies, such as the star formation rate, kinematics, metal abundances, it is hoped that the clustering properties of the high-redshift galaxies can set significant constraints on galaxy formation models.

Current theoretical models (e.g. the standard CDM model and the $`\lambda `$-dominated CDM model) have been fine-tuned to fit the local observations. The degeneracy found in the model parameters might be broken with the help of observations at high redshift, like those of Lyman-break galaxies.

The clustering of Lyman-break galaxies is found to be consistent with the predictions of most currently interesting models, partly because these models have been tested by other observations and partly because LBGs with different host halo mass can exhibit the same clustering property as long as galaxy formation recipes are tuned correspondingly. In a recent study by Wechsler et al. (2001, hereafter W01), five scenarios were examined for associating dark matter halos in the standard LCDM model with Lyman-break galaxies, and the clustering length of the model galaxies was compared with the observations of Adelberger & Steidel (2000). They conclude that the strong clustering of Lyman-break galaxies can generally be reproduced in different cosmogonic models (including the mixed dark matter model) by adjusting the galaxy formation recipes (e.g. introducing plausible physical processes like starbursts, but in an average way by adjusting various global parameters). Although the host halo mass is rather different in different cosmogonic models, these differences could not be used to discriminate among models, mainly because reliable determinations of the mass of halos hosting Lyman break galaxies are lacking. Early spectroscopic observations indicate that the LBGs are hosted by massive halos (Steidel et al. 1996), but recent observations reveal that the disk rotation within Lyman-break galaxies could be much slower than was thought before (Pettini et al. 2001). Thus between models of different hosting galaxies a choice could not be made yet.

The pairwise velocity dispersion (PVD) of galaxies, which probes the dark matter potential, could provide information about the dark matter distribution which is independent of and complementary to the spatial distribution of galaxies (e.g. the two-point correlation function). The PVD has already been widely applied to the local redshift surveys of galaxies, and has yielded very valuable information about the dynamics of local galaxies which has been widely taken as important input for the cosmological models. The PVD of galaxies determined (Davis & Peebles 1983) from the first wide angle redshift survey of galaxies, the Center for Astrophysics (CfA) redshift survey, was one principal reason to argue for biased galaxy formation, i.e. for a difference in the distribution of the galaxies and the dark matter particles. This survey was later found to be too small for robustly measuring the PVD (Mo et al. 1993). The publicly available Las Campanas Redshift survey of galaxies is about ten times larger than the CfA, and Jing, Mo, & Börner(1998, hereafter JMB98) have measured the PVD for this survey. The accurate PVD measurement of the LCRS survey not only constrains the $`\beta `$ parameter of the CDM models to around $`0.4`$ (where $`\beta =\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{0.6}\sigma _8`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$ is the current density parameter and $`\sigma _8`$ the rms linear density contrast within a sphere of $`8h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$), but also suggests an anti-bias for the local galaxy distribution on very small scales. The statistical results of JMB98 are confirmed by a recent analysis of the early data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (Zehavi et al. 2002).

The PVD could also be a very important observable quantity for high redshift galaxies, when redshift surveys, like those of the Lyman Break galaxies and the DEEP2 survey become available. The local observations, like the cluster abundance, the PVD of galaxies, and the peculiar velocity field of galaxies, require that the $`\beta `$ is around $`0.40.5`$ almost independently of whether the cosmos is open, flat or dominated by vacuum energy. The local degeneracy may be broken by the PVD observation at high redshift. Because the density fluctuation grows quite differently in different cosmological models, the $`\beta `$ value is very different at high redshifts in these models. The $`\beta `$ value is much smaller in the SCDM than that in the LCDM model, as is the pairwise velocity dispersion of the dark matter. Since the Lyman-break galaxies are known from their high spatial correlation to be a biased tracer of the dark matter they do not uniformly sample the dark matter distribution, so the pairwise velocity dispersion of LBGs could differ significantly from that of the dark matter. Thus a measurement of their PVD may be useful to put constraints on the galaxy formation models, but it is unknown if it is feasible to measure this important quantity with observations available now or in the near future.

In this paper, we investigate this important issue within two CDM models: the SCDM and LCDM. We will attempt to address the following four questions: 1) how does the bias of the LBGs relative to the dark matter show up in the PVD; 2) how does the PVD of Lyman break galaxies depend on the cosmological model; 3) how does the PVD of LBGs depend on the recipes for galaxy formation; 4) how accurately can one measure the PVD of Lyman break galaxies with currently available samples and with samples available in the near future.

Although this work is focused on the Lyman Break galaxies, the approach is readily extended to other high-redshift galaxy surveys, like the DEEP2 survey, where an important goal is the measurement of the PVD of galaxies at redshift about one (Coil et al. 2001). As galaxies at $`z=1`$ may be more closely connected to the galaxies at $`z=0`$, the PVD study of the DEEP2 survey can probably yield interesting constraints on theoretical models.

The paper is arranged as follows: We will use a plausible phenomenological model to identify Lyman break galaxies from high-resolution N-body simulations, as described in §2. The model predicts the occupation number of galaxies within halos. This agrees very well with the prediction of a physically motivated semi-analytical model of galaxy formation. Because the PVD and the correlation function of galaxies mainly depend on the occupation number of galaxies in halos, we believe that our results represent the prediction of a class of physically motivated galaxy formation models. We also investigate how the PVD depends on formation models of galaxies and the difference in PVD between galaxies and dark matter. We will discuss the possibility of discriminating between cosmological models with the PVD measurement. In §3, we consider a set of mock samples generated according to the observational strategy of Steidel et al. (1998), and assess the accuracy of the PVD measurement with currently available Lyman break galaxy samples and with samples available in the near future. With these mock samples we will also discuss how the measurement depends on the assumption of the world model. Our results will be further discussed in the final section §4.

## 2 Identification of LBGs in CDM simulations and their clustering properties

We consider two typical Cold Dark Matter (CDM) models. One is the (no longer) standard CDM model (SCDM) with a density parameter $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=1`$, and the other is a flat CDM model with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=0.3`$ and a vacuum energy density $`\lambda _0=0.7`$ (LCDM). These CDM models are completely fixed with regard to the dark matter clustering once the linear density power spectrum is chosen. The linear transfer function of Bardeen et al. (1986) together with a primordial Harrison-Zel’dovich spectrum is taken for the models. The linear power spectrum is then fixed by the shape parameter $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\mathrm{\Omega }_0h`$ and the amplitude $`\sigma _8`$ (the rms top-hat density fluctuation on radius $`8h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$). The values of ($`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, $`\sigma _8`$) are (0.5, 0.62) for SCDM and (0.2, 1) for LCDM. We note that all the parameters taken for the LCDM are consistent with observations, and this model now indeed can be viewed as the standard CDM model.

The simulations were generated on the Fujitsu VPP300/16R supercomputer at the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. Each simulation is performed with a vectorized $`\mathrm{P}^3\mathrm{M}`$ code using $`256^3`$ ($`17`$ million) particles. The box size is $`100h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ and the effective force resolution $`\eta 0.039h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$. These CDM simulations were used by Jing & Suto (1998) to study the constraints on cosmological models derived from the high concentration of the Lyman Break galaxies at redshift $`z3`$ discovered by Steidel et al. (1998).They were also used to study the clustering of dark matter halos (Jing 1998) and many other interesting problems.

Galaxies, including Lyman break galaxies, are believed to form within dark matter halos. We find halos in the simulations using the Friends-of-Friends (FOF) method with the bonding length equal to 0.2 times the mean particle separation. Between redshift 2 and 4, each of our simulations has seven outputs with time intervals $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{ln}(1+z)=0.08`$, and all halos with more than 10 FOF members have been identified at each epoch.

It is, however, highly non-trivial to relate galaxies to the identified halos in a quantitative way. In early studies the strong clustering of the LBGs was implemented by a one-to-one correspondence between a galaxy and a halo above certain mass threshold. This massive halo model (Mo & Fukugita 1996; Adelberger et al. 1998; Wechsler et al. 1998; Jing & Suto 1998; Bagla 1998; Coles et al. 1998; Moscardini et al. 1998; Arnouts et al. 1999), though extremely simplified, provided an explanation at least in a qualitative manner, of most of the observed properties of LBGs, especially their strong clustering. Semi-analytical methods (Cole et al. 1994; Baugh et al. 1998; Katz et al. 1999; Somerville et al. 2000; Weinberg et al. 2000; W01), which allow to take physical processes such as gas cooling, halo and galaxy merging, star formation and its feedback, into account in a more realistic way, have been employed to determine the relation between galaxies and halos. If galaxies form quiescently from the cooled gas within halos, these galaxies lie essentially in halos with a narrow range of masses. Thus the quiescent model is actually very similar to the massive halo model, although in the former model, the lower halo mass cutoff is not sharp and the most massive halos which are more massive than the typical halos can host more than one galaxy. In these aspects, the quiescent model is believed to be more realistic than the massive halo model. On the other hand, the quiescent model has its own uncertainties, e.g. star formation law of cold gas at high redshift can be chosen in a variety of ways. Also the influence of galaxy collisions on star formation is uncertain.

In this paper we present a simple model for relating Lyman-break galaxies to halos. We assume that LBGs seen at redshift $`z_o`$ formed within FOF halos above a certain mass $`M_h`$ at an earlier time $`z_f`$ with a one-to-one correspondence. The galaxy is tagged to the particle of the minimum of the gravitational potential within the halo. The position and velocity of the galaxy at redshift $`z_o`$ are derived from those of the minimum-potential particles. Thus we have equivalently assumed that no merger happened to galaxies between redshift $`z_o`$ and redshift $`z_f`$. We use $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z\mathrm{ln}(1+z_f)\mathrm{ln}(1+z_o)`$ as a parameter. The number density of LBG peaks at $`z_o3.0`$, and the observations of Steidel et al. (1996) indicate that stars of Lyman Break galaxies are roughly one Gyr old, that is $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z0.32`$ for the LCDM model. Compared with the massive halo model, we allow very massive halos to host more than one galaxy. This property is important for studying the velocity dispersion of galaxies, since it has been known that the velocity dispersion is sensitive to the presence of groups or clusters of galaxies.

Once this parameter has been fixed, we can determine the parameter $`M_h`$ based on the facts that the comoving density of galaxies at redshift $`z=3`$ should be above $`1.0\times 10^3h^3\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$, and that the correlation length is about $`5.0h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ for the LCDM universe ($`4.0\times 10^3h^3\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$ and $`3.1h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ for the SCDM model) (GD01). We use the observed density as the lower limit, because the samples of LBGs may not have included all the galaxies in the survey volumes (GD01). The two-point correlation function (TPCF) of the model LBGs is presented in Figure 1 for several choices of $`M_h`$. The spatial distribution of the model LBGs is positively biased, and the bias increases with the mass parameter $`M_h`$ as expected. Comparing with the observed values of the clustering length (GD01), we find that $`M_h=2.0\times 10^{11}h^1M_{}`$ and $`1.7\times 10^{11}h^1M_{}`$ are suitable choices for the LCDM model and the SCDM model, respectively. These models are LCDM40 and SCDM10 in Table 1. For these $`M_h`$ values, the spatial number densities of model LBGs are about $`7`$ and $`14\times 10^3h^3\mathrm{Mpc}^3`$ respectively, somewhat larger than the observed density for LBGs brighter than $`25.5`$ in the red band (Steidel et al. 1999; Adelberger & Steidel 2000; GD01), and so meets the above density criterion. We have examined the LCDM model further by considering the occupation number distribution of galaxies in halos. Figure 2 shows this quantity together with the semi-analytical predictions of W01 for this cosmological model. The mean occupation number from our prescription is very close to the predictions of their Constant Efficiency Quiescent model and Accelerated Quiescent model, but slightly higher than the prediction of their Collisional Starburst for massive haloes. Their work, which carefully compared the clustering on small scales in models and in observations of Lyman break galaxies, strongly favors the first two models, implying that our simple prescription has already caught the main physical processes related to the formation of LGBs. For the purpose of this paper which is to examine the pairwise velocity dispersion of LBGs, our recipe for identifying LBGs in the simulations should be adequate , since the statistics examined in this paper are mainly determined by the occupation number distribution (JMB98).

The pairwise velocity dispersion of the model LBGs is presented in Figure 3, together with that of the dark matter for a comparison. The PVDs of the model LBGs for the range of halo mass $`M_h`$ considered are all higher than the PVDs of the dark matter, and they increase with the halo mass $`M_h`$. A similar behavior is seen in the TPCF. This result can be easily understood, since the LBGs in the model are located in massive halos. Although the dark matter has a much higher PVD in the LCDM model than in the SCDM model, the LBGs with $`M_h2\times 10^{11}h^1M_{}`$ have a very similar PVD in both cosmological models. This indicates that the local degeneracy of the two cosmological models may not be broken with the measurements of the two-point CF and the pairwise velocity dispersion for LBGs. It also must be admitted that there are big uncertainties still in our current knowledge of how LBGs have formed. Previous work including the semi-analytical work of W01 to which our simple model has been compared, indicates that LBGs are formed within massive halos. But some recent observations and theoretical models indicate that LBGs are preferentially formed within less massive halos (Pettini et al. 2001; Shu, Mao, & Mo 2001). It would be important to find observations to discriminate between these different theoretical approaches. This is exactly one of our initial motivations to consider the PVD for LBGs.

Different formation models will predict different Occupation number Distributions of galaxies within Halos (ODH). Different ODHs can be produced in our model by adjusting the two model parameters $`M_h`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$. For a given $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$, LBGs are preferentially within massive halos for larger $`M_h`$. For a given $`M_h`$, LBGs are preferentially within small halos for a small $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$, because fewer mergers happened within a shorter time period and massive halos have fewer LBGs than when $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$ is larger. These points can be clearly seen from Figure 4 where we plotted the ODH for several models with different combinations of $`M_h`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$ listed in Table 1.

In Figures 5 and 6, we plot the TPCF and velocity dispersion for the models listed in Table 1. By our design, all these models have very similar angular TPCFs, though their ODHs and cosmogony are quite different, indicating that these models cannot be distinguished by the observation of the TPCF alone. However, the PVDs are significantly different for different ODHs. The key question now is, whether observational catalogues of LBGs already available or available in the near future are large enough for this purpose. We will address this issue in the next section, where we will examine the feasibility of measuring the PVD of LBGs using mock samples.

## 3 Accuracy of measuring PVD for LBGs

Our simulations have 7 outputs between $`z=2`$ and $`z=4`$. We generate our mock samples by combining LBGs at these outputs with periodic replications. We will mainly use the LBGs with $`M_h2.0\times 10^{11}h^1M_{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z=0.32`$ for the analysis of this section, since we think that this sample is sufficient for our purpose of examining the PVD measurement error. The peculiar velocity is taken into account properly when computing the redshift for each mock galaxy. The mock samples are generated in pencil beams with a fixed sky area of $`9^{}\times 18^{}`$. The galaxies are further randomly culled according to the redshift selection function (Figure 7). The selection function is obtained from a spline-interpolation of the redshift distribution histogram presented by Pettini et al.(1997) and is normalized so that the galaxy surface density is 0.8 per square arcminute as observed by GD01. A total of 1000 of such beams has been produced in randomly selected directions (all cross correlations between such beams are neglected here). Our method of generating the mock samples is essentially the same as that of Jing & Suto (1998).

When measuring the TPCF and PVD for the mock samples, we first assume a world model and then compute comoving coordinates for each mock galaxy in redshift space. Given a pair of galaxies with comoving coordinates $`𝐪_1`$ and $`𝐪_2`$, we define $`𝐬=𝐪_1𝐪_2`$ and $`𝐥=\frac{1}{2}(𝐪_1+𝐪_2)`$. Then for a flat universe and under the small angle approximation, the separations along ($`\pi `$) and perpendicular ($`r_p`$) to the line of sight are,

$$\pi =𝐬𝐥/|𝐥|,$$
(1)
$$r_p^2=𝐬𝐬\pi ^2.$$
(2)
We estimate the redshift-space two-point correlation function $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$ by

$$\xi _z(r_p,\pi )=\frac{4RR(r_p,\pi )DD(r_p,\pi )}{[DR(r_p,\pi )]^2}1,$$
(3)
where $`DD(r_p,\pi )`$, $`DR(r_p,\pi )`$ and $`RR(r_p,\pi )`$ refer to the counts of data-data, data-random and random-random pairs with separations $`\pi `$ and $`r_p`$ respectively (Hamilton 1993). A random sample, which contains 200,000 points, is generated in the same way as the mock samples, except that the points are randomly distributed in redshift space before the selection effects are applied.

The projected two-point correlation function $`w(r_p)`$ is estimated from

$$w(r_p)=\underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\xi _z(r_p,\pi )𝑑\pi =\underset{i}{}\xi _z(r_p,\pi _i)\mathrm{\Delta }\pi _i,$$
(4)
where $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$ is measured by equation (3). In order to examine the dependence of the measurement accuracy on the sample size, we combine pencil beams into groups and calculate the mean and standard variance of $`w(r_p)`$ among the beam groups. Every beam group may have 10, 20 or 50 beams, for the currently available data contain already 10 beams and a sample as large as 50 beams is expected to be available in the near future. The projected two-point correlation function for one randomly selected beam group is presented in each panel of Figure 8. Triangles are the mean among different beams in the group, and error bars show the corresponding $`1\sigma `$ scatter among the beams divided by the square root of the beam number in the group. Different assumptions about the world model lead to a shift in the amplitude because of the different world geometries.

The projected function $`w(r_p)`$ is simply related to the real space TPCF as

$$w(r_p)=\underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\xi (\sqrt{r_p^2+y^2})𝑑y.$$
(5)
Assuming a power-law for the two point correlation function $`\xi `$

$$\xi (r)=(r_0/r)^\gamma ,$$
(6)
we can find $`\xi (r)`$ through a fit of Eq.(5) to the observed $`w(r_p)`$. In practice, an upper limit $`\pi _u`$ must be imposed on the integral variables of Eq.(4) and Eq.(5). We will use $`\pi _u=17.9h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ when a low density world model is assumed for calculating the distance and $`10.0h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ when the Einstein de-Sitter world model is assumed. The power law fitting works well for the projected function $`w(r_p)`$ (Figure 8), and we also found that the fitted result describes the 3-d TPCF very well at $`0.5\stackrel{<}{}r\stackrel{<}{}20h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ (see Table 1). The fitting results are quite robust to a reasonable change in $`\pi _u`$: a $`50\%`$ increase or decrease in $`\pi _u`$ does not change the results much (less than $`3\%`$ for both $`r_0`$ and $`\gamma `$).

The pairwise velocity dispersion (PVD) for galaxies is measured in observations by comparing the redshift space two-point correlation function $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$ along and perpendicular to the line-of-sight. An example of this quantity, which is measured from a randomly selected 50-beam group of LCDM40, is shown in Figure 9. In the left hand panel, the cosmological parameters assumed for calculating the comoving distance are the same as those of the model itself, while in the right panel an Einstein-de Sitter Universe is assumed when estimating the distance. One can find that in both cases the maps are distorted similarly on small scales. Assuming the wrong cosmology introduces a compression factor of 1.2 along the direction of $`\pi `$, but this effect cannot be separated from the velocity dispersion (see below) so it cannot be used to measure the world geometry (cf. Matsubara & Suto 1996).

Temporarily let the effect of a possible cosmological geometry distortion be absorbed into the PVD measurement. The PVD of galaxies is measured by modeling the redshift distortion in the observed redshift space correlation function $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$. Following Peebles(1980), Fisher et al. (1994) and JMB98, we assume:

$$1+\xi _z(r_p,\pi )=f(v_{12})\{1+\xi [\sqrt{r_p^2+(\pi v_{12}(1+z)/H(z))^2}]\}𝑑v_{12},$$
(7)
where $`H(z)`$ is the Hubble constant at redshift $`z`$. For the real space TPCF $`\xi (r)`$, the power-law fit of the data is used, and for $`f(v_{12})`$, the distribution function of the relative velocity along the line of sight, we adopt an exponential form as follows which is supported by observations (Davis & Peebles 1983; Fisher et al. 1994), theoretical models(Diaferio & Geller 1996; Sheth 1996; Seto & Yokoyama 1998) and direct simulations (Efstathiou et al. 1988; Magira, Jing & Suto 1999):

$$f(v_{12})=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}\sigma _{12}}\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\sqrt{2}}{\sigma _{12}}|v_{12}\overline{v_{12}}|),$$
(8)
where $`\overline{v_{12}}`$ is the mean and $`\sigma _{12}`$ the dispersion of the one-dimensional pairwise peculiar velocities. Here we use two infall models for reconstructing the PVD from the mock samples. In both models,

$$\overline{v_{12}}=y\overline{V_{12}}(r)/r,$$
(9)
where $`y`$ is the separation along the line of sight in real space and $`\overline{V_{12}}`$ is the mean relative velocity of two galaxies with a separation $`r`$. The velocity difference $`\overline{V_{12}}`$ can be directly measured from the simulations, but hardly in observations. To see the sensitivity of the results to this quantity, we adopt two types of $`\overline{V_{12}}`$ for equation (8): one is called the real infall model which is the quantity directly measured from corresponding simulation data of LBGs, and the other is called the average infall model which is an average for this quantity from LCDM40 and SCDM10.

When estimating $`\sigma _{12}`$ with the least square fitting method (cf. JMB98), we measure the average of $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$ over beams in the group under consideration and use the inverse of the standard error of the averaged $`\xi _z(r_p,\pi )`$ as the weight in the least-square fitting. The fitting results are illustrated in Figure 10 for one 50-beam LCDM40 mock sample which indicates that the fitting model works quite satisfactorily. The real space two-point CF $`\xi (r)`$ (i.e. without a redshift distortion) is plotted for comparison.

The measurement of the PVD from mock samples using the above procedure is compared in Figure 11 with the true PVD directly calculated from simulation. The true PVD is defined as $`[𝐯_{12}(𝐫)^2𝐯_{12}(𝐫)\widehat{𝐫}^2]/3^{1/2}`$. The dashed lines are the true PVD obtained at two epochs $`z=2.86`$ and $`3.18`$, where the density of observed galaxies (due to the selection effect) is peaked. The points and error bars are the average and standard variance respectively, among the results of 100 ten-beam samples and 20 fifty-beam samples. In the plot, we assumed a correct world model for calculating the comoving distance. At these $`r_p`$, the standard deviation among those 10-beam (50-beam) samples is about $`80\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ ($`35\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) which should be the typical error in the real measurement when the observational sample is as large as the mock sample. Variation of $`\pi _u`$ from $`13.5`$ to $`27h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ introduces a shift of the PVD of several $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ at the first three $`r_p`$ and by tens at the last. Therefore the effect of varying $`\pi _u`$ is in general negligible. It has been noted that the PVD measured with the above procedure may differ from that given directly by the 3-D velocities of galaxies (JMB98). For this mock sample, the PVD reconstructed from the redshift distortion agrees very well with that from the 3D velocity, and is also quite robust to a reasonable change of the infall model. So, different galaxy formation models which show a difference of a few hundred $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ in the PVD can be tested with progressively larger samples, as seen from Fig. 6.

Figure 12 shows the predictions for the pairwise velocity dispersion measured from a set of mock samples of LCDM40 (solid lines, filled symbols with error bars) and SCDM10 (dotted lines, open symbols with error bars). Let the observer assume that the cosmology is either that of LCDM or that of SCDM. These world models are quite typical in current research work. The lines in the figure are obtained by assuming a correct world model and the symbols by assuming a wrong world model. Furthermore, we use two types of infall models: left hand panels show the real infall model and right hand panels the average infall model. From the figure, we find: 1) the PVD is the same for LCDM40 and SCDM10 mock smaples at small separations. This is consistent with the result seen in the 3-d PVD of Figure 3, reinforcing that these two models could not be distinguished by the PVD measurement; 2) the typical error is $`80\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$, $`60\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$, and $`35\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ for the PVD at a separation $`r_p1h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$ for the beam number 10, 20 and 50 respectively. It is easy to see that the error decreases with the square root of the beam number; 3) assuming the wrong world model can bring about an increase or a reduction of up to $`100\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ at $`r_p=5h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$. But the effect is smaller for smaller separations, and is negligible for $`r_p1h^1\mathrm{Mpc}`$; 4) the difference of the PVD caused by the difference in the infall models is small, generally less than $`20\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. Actually, when using PVD to distinguish theoretical models, we compare observed results with those of mock samples rather than with real 3-D PVD due to definition difference, the effects in 3) and 4) will disappear completely.

## 4 Discussion and conclusions

We have investigated the feasibility of determining the pairwise velocity dispersion for the Lyman Break Galaxies, and of using this quantity as a discriminator among theoretical models. Our central conclusion is that the PVDs change significantly with different schemes of galaxy formation within the same cosmogony model. On the other hand, with similar galaxy formation models, the same two-point correlation function and pairwise velocity dispersion can be obtained for several currently popular cosmogony models. Thus, the PVD of high-redshift objects can be used to set constraints on the way galaxies form (even through cosmogony keeps unknown).

We have proposed a simple phenomenological model for the formation of Lyman break galaxies which is determined by the formation interval parameter $`\mathrm{\Delta }_z`$ and the halo mass threshold $`M_h`$. With a reasonable choice for these two parameters, our model predicts an occupation number distribution of galaxies in halos which agrees very well with the predictions of semi-analytical models (W01). This implies that our model incorporates the essential physical processes involved in the formation of the Lyman Break galaxies. Since in our scheme the properties of LBGs are mainly determined by the occupation number distributions of galaxies, we can allow for uncertainties in the current understandings (e.g. the semi-analytical model) of galaxy formation by adjusting the two model parameters. It is likely that the massive halo model and the recent model proposed by Shu et al. (2001) can predict a PVD a few hundred $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ smaller than our fiducial models at the same separation $`r_p`$. Our tests with mock samples show that such models can already be constrained with currently available observed samples (if the measurement error of the redshift is negligible; see discussion below), where the PVD has a typical error of $`80\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. This error will be reduced by a factor of 2 if the samples are increased four times. Therefore the PVD will become another promising statistic to test galaxy formation models with redshift samples of LBGs.

The determination of the PVD at small separation $`r_p`$ is insensitive to the assumptions about the world model for computing the comoving separations of galaxies. Measuring redshift distortions at small scales therefore cannot be used to measure the cosmological parameters, though the cosmological parameters might be effectively constrained by the distortion measurement on larger scales (Matsubra & Suto 1996; Ballinger et al. 1996).

The typical error of the PVD for a 10-beam sample is $`80\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ only, and this is really the accuracy one can achieve with currently available redshift samples of LBGs. As Mo et al. (1993) and later other authors (Zurek et al. 1994; Marzke et al. 1995) found, the value of PVD is very sensitive to the presence or absence of rich clusters in a sample, and a redshift sample much larger than the CfA survey which has about 2000 galaxies is needed to achieve an accuracy of $`100\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ in the determination of the PVD for local galaxies. Indeed the accuracy of measuring the PVD for the Las Campanas Redshift Survey which contains 25,000 galaxies is $`75\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (JMB98), very similar to our expected error for a 10-beam sample of LBGs. The reason is simply that the PVD is better determined at high redshift, because there rich clusters are much rarer, and the effective volume of 10 beams is large enough to include many massive halos formed at that time.

So far we have not taken into account the measurement error in observing the redshift. The measurement error may be treated just like a random motion which can contribute to the measured result of the pairwise peculiar velocity. Thus, in order that the PVD of the LBGs can be measured, the redshift error is required to be much smaller than $`400\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1/\sqrt{2}/c0.001`$. Correspondingly, the spectral resolution in the measurement should be better than $`7\stackrel{\mathrm{o}}{\mathrm{A}}`$ at $`7000\stackrel{\mathrm{o}}{\mathrm{A}}`$, if just one line is used. Steidel et al. (1998) measured the redshifts from $`7`$ strong absorption features in the rest-frame far-UV and, when possible, the Ly$`\alpha `$ emission line, so the random error may not be a problem for measuring the PVD. It is also noted that there is a systematic difference between redshifts determined from emission lines and from absorption lines (Steidel et al. 1998; Pettini et al. 2001). This systematic difference should be taken into account, and its effect on the PVD measurement may be reduced if redshifts either from absorption lines or from emission lines only are adopted. Furthermore, with the help of near-IR spectroscopy of some of the high redshift galaxies, which measures the true redshift (Steidel et al. 1998), we can model the distribution of the redshift error, and thus it is possible to lessen its effect by adding one term to the right hand side of Equation (7) to correct the random error.

## acknowledgments

We are grateful to Risa Wechsler for kindly making their model predictions of the galaxy occupation numbers available to us, and to Houjun Mo for helpful suggestion. DHZ thanks the CAS-MPG exchange program for support. The research work was supported in part by the One-Hundred-Talent Program, by NKBRSF (G19990754) and by NSFC (No.10125314).


format: text

text:
# A Simple Prediction on the Surface Density of Galaxies at 𝑧≃6

## 1 Introduction

In the last several years, our knowledge about the Universe at high redshift has been gradually extended to $`z6`$. As of today, five galaxies at $`z>5.5`$ (Weymann et al. 1998; Hu et al. 1999, 2002; Dawson et al. 2001) and four quasars at $`z>5.5`$ (Fan et al. 2000, 2001) have been spectroscopically confirmed. The complete Gunn-Peterson trough detected in the $`z=6.28`$ SDSS quasar by Becker et al. (2001) and further investigation (Fan et al. 2002) led these authors to tentatively identify the end of reionization epoch of the Universe at $`z6`$. Thus the assessment of $`z6`$ galaxy number counts at different brightness levels will have a very direct cosmological impact, since it will quantify the number density of UV-emitting objects that are the physical cause of the reionization. Several systematic surveys aimed at discovering a significant number of $`z6`$ galaxies have now been proposed and are being carried out. To make such surveys efficient, we need to have a rough idea of the surface density of galaxies at $`z6`$. There are a few theoretical predictions on the surface density of galaxies at high redshifts, either based on N-body simulations (cf. Weinberg et al. 1999, 2002) or based on semi-analytic formalisms (cf. Robinson & Silk 2000). However, those predictions are more qualitative than quantitative at this point, because they either are limited by finite volume and finite resolution, or have to rely on several parameters which remain very uncertain in the absence of significant amounts of actual data. Thus one may prefer not to base survey plans directly on such predictions at the moment.

In this paper we present a simple, observational approach. We may $`assume`$ a reasonable luminosity function for galaxies at $`z6`$ by $`extrapolating`$ the known results at $`z3`$, which is the highest redshift where the luminosity function of galaxies has been quantified over a wide enough brightness range (Steidel et al. 1999). We will use existing data at $`z`$$`\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{_>}{^{}}`$5 to constrain the normalization of this $`extrapolated`$ luminosity function. Once the $`z6`$ luminosity function is estimated in this way, the surface density can be calculated in a straightforward manner, $`i.e.`$, by numerically integrating the luminosity function over the volume occupied by unit sky-coverage in the redshift bin of interest. In §2, we present the details of such a surface density prediction over the range $`5.5z6.5`$. We compare our prediction to all the available observations in §3. Comparison to two theoretical models is made in §4. A summary is given in §5.

## 2 The Predicted Surface Density of Galaxies at $`5.5z6.5`$

### 2.1 The Extrapolated Luminosity Function

We start with the $`z3`$ luminosity function from Steidel et al. (1999), who merged the ground-based and the HDF-N Lyman-break galaxy samples. Since the $`z3`$ sample used in Steidel et al. (1999) was selected based on the Lyman-break signature in the SED of galaxies, our approach makes the implicit assumption that galaxies at higher redshifts also manifest themselves by the Lyman-break feature. Because the line-of-sight intervening H I absorption is more severe at higher redshifts and the effective break moves from the 912Å Lyman limit to the $`Ly\alpha `$ line at 1216Å (cf. Madau 1995), one can expect that the Lyman-break signature is even stronger, therefore our assumption is likely valid. However, there might exist a different type of galaxy whose UV-photons are completely absorbed by dust, like the ultraluminous infrared galaxies that are known to exist at lower redshifts. There is no Lyman-break for such galaxies, since they have essentially zero flux from the UV to the optical range. Our predictions neglect these objects, because they are also absent from the Lyman-break samples at $`z3`$. Since we deal with the emitted UV, such objects will not affect our conclusions.

The details of the luminosity function extrapolation from $`z3`$ to $`z6`$ depend on the adopted cosmological model. Different cosmological parameters will change the apparent magnitude of an object with a given intrinsic brightness, and will also affect the physical volume corresponding to a given sky coverage. We consider three cosmological models, namely, a flat universe without cosmological constant ($`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=1`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0`$), a flat, low mass universe with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$, and an open universe without cosmological constant ($`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0`$). For simplicity, we denote the three models by their $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ values as the (1, 0), (0.3, 0.7), and (0.2, 0) models, respectively. Throughout the paper we use a Hubble constant of $`H_0=65kms^1Mpc^1`$. All the quoted magnitudes are AB magnitudes and, unless noted otherwise, refer to the 1400 – 1500Å spectral range in the rest-frame.

The luminosity function of $`z3`$ galaxies of Steidel et al. (1999; see their section 4.3) is a Schechter function of the form $`\mathrm{\Phi }(L)=(\mathrm{\Phi }^{}/L^{})(L/L^{})^\alpha exp(L/L^{})`$. The $`L^{}`$ galaxies at this redshift have $``$-band apparent magnitude of $`m^{}=24.48`$ mag. At $`z=3.04`$ (the median redshift for Steidel et al.’s sample), this $`m^{}`$ value corresponds to $`M^{}=20.37`$, $`21.23`$ and $`21.31`$ mag in the (1, 0), (0.3, 0.7) and (0.2, 0) models, respectively. The $``$-band has central wavelength of $`\lambda _0=6930`$Å, or $`1700`$Å in the rest-frame at $`z3`$. Since the SED of a young non-dusty galaxy in $`f_\nu `$ is essentially flat from 1400 – 1700Å, these magnitudes apply to the 1400 – 1500Å range as well. As a first approximation, we also assume that there is no significant luminosity evolution for galaxies from $`z3`$ to $`5.5z6.5`$, such that $`L^{}`$ galaxies at $`5.5z6.5`$ still have the above mentioned absolute magnitudes. Possible evolution effects will be discussed in §5. We noticed that Steidel et al. (1999) made a similar assumption in comparing the ground-based + the HDF-N sample at $`z4`$ to its counterpart at $`z3`$, concluding that the observed $`z4`$ galaxy distribution was completely consistent with such an assumption at the bright end, and within a factor of two at the faint-end. In fact, they suggested that the faint end mismatch was due to the genuine structure in the small HDF-N field, rather than a true luminosity function discrepancy. We use continuum magnitudes, ignoring the possible contribution of $`Ly\alpha `$ line emission, for two reasons: 1) only 50% of the galaxies in the sample of Steidel et al. are $`Ly\alpha `$ emitters, although there was a strong bias in favor of such objects in the spectroscopic identification, and 2) the vast majority of those $`Ly\alpha `$ emitters are weak in $`Ly\alpha `$ strength. We assume a slope of $`\alpha =1.6`$, but our conclusions are insensitive to the exact value.

Next we choose a normalization to fix the luminosity function, which amounts to allowing density evolution. Observationally, this can be done by adjusting $`\mathrm{\Phi }^{}`$ such that the calculated surface density, either differential or cumulative, matches the availible observations. This is difficult in our case, since there is no precise observed value to be used. There are only four published $`z>5.5`$ galaxies with spectroscopic information. These are the z=5.60 galaxy in the HDF-N (Weymann et al. 1998), the z=5.74 galaxy in the Hawaii Survey Field SSA22 (Hu et al. 1999), and the z=5.767 and z=5.631 galaxies in the HDF-N flanking fields (Dawson et al. 2001). Statistically, these results are inadequate for the purpose of normalization, because their selection is not readily quantifiable. Nevertheless, we can still make a rough estimate of the cumulative surface densities of $`z5.5`$ galaxies in the well-studied HDF-N and use this value as our normalization. We consider two cases: a cumulative surface density of 1.37 per arcmin2 and 0.11 per arcmin2, both to a limit $`m_{AB}=27.0`$ mag. The former case (high normalization) is equivalent to $`one`$ $`z5.5`$ galaxy per NIC-3 field (cf. Thompson et al. 1999) and the later one (low normalization) is equivalent to $`one`$ such galaxy per WFPC2 HDF coverage. Note that $`m_{AB}=27.0`$ mag is $`not`$ the magnitude of this z=5.60 galaxy, but an estimate of the selection limit for a galaxy at $`z5.5`$ as observed at 9100 – 9800Å. This galaxy is $`not`$ a $`Ly\alpha `$ emitter, confirming that the magnitude in our prediction should be taken as referring to the continuum brightness level rather than including this emission line.

### 2.2 The Predicted Surface Densities

Cumulative surface densities can now be calculated by numerically integrating the luminosity function over the volume occupied by unit sky coverage in the range $`5.5z6.5`$. Fig. 1 shows these results, where the cumulative surface density is presented as the total number of galaxies per deg2, whose brightness is brighter than a specified apparent AB magnitude. The predictions for the (1, 0), (0.3, 0.7) and (0.2, 0) models are plotted in solid, long-dashed and short-dashed lines, respectively. Thick lines are used for the high normalization case, while thin lines are used for the low normalization one. The absolute magnitude scales are labeled on top of the figure, from bottom to the top for the (1, 0), (0.3, 0.7) and (0.2, 0) models, respectively. The $`M^{}`$ values for these models are labeled in the legend in the parenthesis together with the corresponding apparent magnitudes, and are also indicated along the absolute magnitude scales at the top by upward arrows. Numerical results are presented in Table 1, where the number density is listed as number of galaxies per arcmin2 for straightforward use in planning future observations.

## 3 Consistency Check from Limited Observations

As a minimal consistency check, we compare our predictions to the limited (direct and indirect) observations in hand for galaxies at $`z6`$.

### 3.1 The Intermediate Brightness Level ($`23<m_{AB}<24`$ mag)

Our group has started a multi-color search for $`z6`$ object, aimed at constraining the luminosity function at this intermediate brightness level. Four medium-band filters, namely, $`m(802nm)`$, $`n(848nm)`$, $`o(919nm)`$ and $`p(974nm)`$, are used in this survey. These are the four reddest of our 15 medium-band filters which cover the entire $`300`$$`1000nm`$ range, and are designed to avoid the brightest and most variable night-sky lines to yield dark background and fringe-free imaging. These four filters are ideal for discriminating the Lyman-break signature in the SED of galaxies at $`5.5z6.5`$. Specifications of these filters can be found in the series of papers of the BATC (Beijing-Arizona-Taiwan-Connecticut) Survey, whose filters are essentially the same but smaller in physical size (Fan et al. 1996; Shang et al. 1998; Zheng et al. 1999; Yan et al. 2000).

Our medium-band data so far allow us to put a meaningful constraint on the luminosity function at $`z6`$. In our pilot run in June 2000, we observed a $`35^{}\times 35^{}`$ area around the HDF-South in the reddest three bands ($`n`$, $`o`$ and $`p`$), using the MOSAIC-II array mounted at the CTIO-4m telescope. Details of the observation will be presented elsewhere (H. Yan et al., in preparation). To summarize, we reached AB magnitudes of $`n(848nm)`$ = 23.2, $`o(919nm)`$ = 23.5 and $`p(974nm)`$ = 23.0 mag at 5-$`\sigma `$ with $`>50\%`$ completeness, and used these images to search for drop-outs at $`z6`$. We found three candidates which were absent from the $`n(848nm)`$-band image but prominent in the $`o(919nm)`$-band. However, since these objects are also very faint in the $`p(974nm)`$-band, imaging in bluer passbands is needed to confirm their nature. Two out of these three objects lie within the broad band $`UBVRI`$ CTIO-4m BTC images of Palunas et al. (2000), whose survey field has about a $`15^{}\times 15^{}`$ overlapping region with ours. These two drop-outs are both clearly visible on the BTC $`R`$-band and shortward images, but not on the I-band image. Thus these two objects are most likely lower redshift interlopers, possibly $`z=2.3`$ quasars with $`MgII`$ redshifted to $``$ 9100Å. This meant that at best only one positive candidate remained that could be at $`z`$ 5.5–6.5.

Based on these results, we can put a safe upper limit to the cumulative number density of $`5.5z6.5`$ objects as one object in $`35^{}\times 35^{}`$ down to the flux limit of $`m_{AB}=23.5`$ mag. This upper limit is indicated on Fig. 1 by an downward arrow, and is consistent with both high and low normalization cases in our prediction.

### 3.2 The Faint End ($`m_{AB}>25`$ mag)

A lower limit at this brightness level can be obtained from the $`z=5.74`$ galaxy of Hu et al. (1999), assuming that its single strong emission line identification is reliable. The galaxy’s $`Z`$-band magnitude (free of the emission line), which is similar to the SDSS $`z^{}`$-band magnitude, is 25.5 mag. Since their survey area is about $`390\mathrm{}\times 280\mathrm{}`$, a simple lower limit estimation is $`log(N)=2.07/\mathrm{deg}^2`$ to $`m=25.5`$ mag. This lower limit is indicated on Fig. 1 as “$``$”, and fits with our high normalization case but not with the low one.

Unfortunately, the two $`z>5.5`$ galaxies of Dawson et al. (2001) cannot be used as a direct constraint to the luminosity function, since no continuum magnitude was given for either of the two. However, because their $`I_{AB}`$ magnitudes are all fainter than 25, their result is at least not in conflict with our estimates above.

### 3.3 Indirect Result at the Bright End ($`m_{AB}23`$ mag)

Finding any $`z6`$ galaxies at these bright levels would require a SDSS-like all-sky survey, but extending at least one magnitude deeper, which is a daunting, if not impossible, task with any existing facilities. However, we can get some information in this regime by using quasar host galaxies as the tracers of the entire galaxy population. To the extent that quasar hosts can be taken as representatives of galaxies, it is possible to obtain a reasonable, although indirect, bright-end lower limit if the hosts luminosity of the known $`z6`$ quasars can be obtained. It has been long suggested that there is a linear relation between the quasar luminosity and the $`minimum`$ luminosity of its host galaxy (cf. McLeod & Rieke 1995), which can be understood in the sense that a more luminous host galaxy is required to fuel a more luminous quasar. Thus there might be a similar relation between the luminosity of the quasar and that of its host at higher redshift. Such a relation would give a luminosity function constraint from the four $`z>5.5`$ quasars known, all discovered by SDSS in $``$ 1500 deg2 of survey area (Fan et al. 2000, 2001).

We construct such a relation from Bahcall et al. (1996), who imaged twenty nearby ($`z<0.3`$) luminous quasars with HST, and obtained their host luminosities. A simple fit to their data gives $`M_{host}=0.425\times M_{qso}11.82`$ ($`rms=0.38`$ mag). Using this formula, we found that the host luminosities of the four $`z>5.5`$ SDSS quasars were almost identical. Their average absolute magnitude at around rest-frame 1400Å is $`M=23.1`$, $`23.5`$ and $`23.7`$ mag ($`rms`$ $``$ 0.2 mag) in the (1, 0), (0.3, 0.7) and (0.2, 0) universe, respectively, which correspond to apparent magnitudes of 22.8, 23.4 and 23.6 mag, respectively, at $`z=6`$. The AGN unification scheme implies that if an AGN is detected, statistically there must be two or more galaxies which also harbor AGN activity, which cannot be detected because obscuring matter in the surrounding torus largely blocks our view. In other words, since there are four $`z>5.5`$ quasars detected in $``$ 1500 deg2, the total number of $`z>5.5`$ galaxies (including the four quasar hosts) is at least 12, implying a number density of $`log(N)2.10/\mathrm{deg}^2`$ at the above mentioned brightness levels. As indicated above, this number should be taken as a lower limit, because there could be some galaxies as luminous as the quasar hosts, but lack a massive central black hole and thus cannot be traced by AGN. This indirect constraint is shown by the upward arrow in Figure 1.

There are two major uncertainties on this bright-end constraint. One is the effect of quasar luminosity evolution. The above linear relation between the hosts and the quasars is inferred from a local sample, yet we apply it to $`z6`$. Typical quasar luminosities have been shown to evolve with redshift, as $`(1+z)^\beta `$ with $`\beta =2.5`$–4 for $`z<2.5`$. This indicates that quasars may have once been brighter with respect to their hosts than we see today. In other words, the hosts of the $`z6`$ quasars could be fainter than we estimated here, and therefore the limits shown in Fig. 1 could be moved more to the right. However, since it is almost impossible to obtain a quantitative estimate about the amplitude of such a shift, we just leave the derived constraint as it is now. Another issue is whether quasar hosts are fair representatives of field galaxies, and therefore whether the above bright-end limit is meaningful. Bahcall et al. (1996) speculated that the quasar hosts might not fit a Schechter function and might be 2.2 mag brighter than field galaxies. However, their suggestion was based on a volume-limited sample, which is clearly not the case for their luminous quasar sample. Furthermore, galaxy evolution clearly cannot be neglected in comparing results from $`z0.2`$ to $`z6`$. Net evolution of the hosts would move this constraint to higher luminosity, running counter to the effect of quasar luminosity evolution.

Even in the light of these caveats, we believe that the bright-end constraint indicated by the SDSS $`z>5.5`$ quasars is useful. In fact, the (1, 0) model, either high or low normalization, and the low normalization case of the (0.2, 0) model, are clearly not consistent with this constraint. The high normalization case of both the (0.3, 0.7) and (0.2, 0) models, on the other hand, are perfectly consistent with this constraint. The low normalization case of the (0.3, 0.7) model is barely consistent with this constraint. Thus, the mere detection of four quasars at $`z>5.5`$ implies a rather high normalization to the counts and luminosity function of galaxies at these redshifts.

### 3.4 Recent Narrow-band Search

The only reported data which seem hard to reconcile with our prediction are from the $`z=5.7`$ $`Ly\alpha `$ emitter search of Rhoads & Malhotra (2001), who used two narrow-band filters to look for $`Ly\alpha `$ emission. They reported 18 robust $`z`$=5.7 $`Ly\alpha `$ emitters in 0.36 deg2 to a 5-$`\sigma `$ survey limit of $`m_{AB}`$=24.8 mag (average for both bands), and discussed cosmological implications of this result. Although these objects have not yet been spectroscopically confirmed, we compared our prediction against this result for the sake of completeness. For simplicity, we only compare it against our high normalization (0.3, 0.7) model.

To make such a comparison, we need both their cumulative number density corrected for the survey volume and the 9100–9800Å continuum magnitudes of their objects. The two narrow-band filters that they used, $`815nm`$ and $`823nm`$, are both 75Å wide and can only pick up $`Ly\alpha `$ emission from $`z=5.70`$ – 5.78. The co-moving volume of their survey is $`3.27\times 10^5Mpc^3`$ for their 0.36 deg2 sky coverage. Our model uses $`5.5z6.5`$, giving a co-moving volume of $`3.96\times 10^6Mpc^3`$ for the same sky coverage. Since their survey volume is only 8% of this, the 18 objects that they detected should only account for 8% of the total galaxies in our prediction. In other words, if the 18 objects were taken at their face values, the total number of galaxies that our model would predict is 225 in our volume at $`5.5z6.5`$. Furthermore, the objects they found are believed to be strong $`Ly\alpha `$ emitters. Although spectroscopic identification is strongly biased in favor of such objects, past studies indicate that they are only a minority of the entire population. If the $`z3`$ Lyman-break galaxy result of Steidel et al. (1999) is universal only $`25\%`$ of the Lyman-break galaxies have $`Ly\alpha `$ emission strong enough to be picked up in such narrow-band searches. This means the total number of $`z5.7`$ galaxies inferred from Rhoads & Malhotra’s result is about 72, and thus the total number of objects that our model would predict is 900. Translated into number density, it amounts to 0.694 per arcmin2. Note that we assume their 18 objects form a complete sample down to their detection limit, which is possibly not the case. If we made a correction for their survey incompleteness, the inferred number density would be even higher.

The continuum magnitudes of these objects were not explicitly given in their paper, therefore we use the equivalent width of the weakest object to estimate their survey limit in terms of continuum magnitude. Using the numbers from Figure 1 of Rhoads & Malhotra (2001), we find that the weakest emitter has $`f_\nu (line)=0.48`$ $`\mu Jy`$ in the line, or equivalently $`m_{AB}(line)=24.70`$ mag, almost approaching their detection limit. Using the approximation that $`f_\nu (line)/f_\nu (continuum)=(W/\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda )+1`$, where $`W`$ is the equivalent width and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda `$ is the bandwidth, we find that $`f_\nu (continuum)=0.23\mu Jy`$, or $`m_{AB}(continuum)=25.50`$ mag. At this brightness level, our model gives the cumulative surface density of only 0.138 per arcmin2.

This comparison shows that Rhoads & Malhotra’s result gives a factor of five times higher cumulative number density as our prediction does. Stated differently, if their result were used as our normalization at $`m_{AB}=25.50`$ mag, the number of $`z6`$ objects in the HDF-N would be much higher ($`>`$ 6 times) than what have been found. Since the Rhoads & Malhotra’s objects still need spectroscopic identification to judge their real nature, we shall not go further than pointing out that there is a discrepancy.

## 4 Compared with Theoretical Models

We compare our estimates with the hierarchical N-body modeling results of Weinberg et al. (2002) in Fig. 2. The thick solid line is our (0.3, 0.7) high normalization estimate. The thin lines of different types are the predictions of Weinberg et al. (2002), reproduced by reading off the numbers from their Figure 8 and following the converting procedures given by their paper. Only three of their models are reproduced here, namely, CCDM, LCDM and OCDM, which correspond to $`(\mathrm{\Omega }_M,\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda })=(1,0)`$, $`(0.4,0.6)`$ and $`(0.4,0)`$, respectively. Their choices of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ are slightly different from ours, but the effects of these on the global trends are only marginal. Two flavors of these models are shown: one is without any dust extinction ($`A=0`$ at restframe 1500Å), and the other is with $`20\%`$ dust extinction ($`A=0.2`$ mag). Note that the count predictions can differ widely solely due to different assumptions about the internal extinction. Obviously only the (0.4, 0.6) model (LCDM) does not conflict with the HDF-N result as summrized in our Fig. 1 and §2.1. Furthermore, nearly all those models predict unrealistically high surface density at mAB$`24.5`$ mag, which is caused by the finite resolution in the simulations. Trading volume for finer resolution (Weinberg et al. 1999), their LCDM result would give a more realistic surface density at the bright end, but again would predict too high a value at the faint end.

It is also interesting to do a comparison among the theoretical predictions. For example, we can compare the result derived from Weinberg et al. (2002) as shown in Figure 2 with the semi-analytic result of Robinson & Silk (2000) as shown in their Figure 3. A direct, quantitative comparison is not meaningful, since the result here is for $`z=6`$ while the highest redshift given in Robinson & Silk’s Figure 3 is $`z=5`$, and their choices of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ are slightly different. But we can still compare the global trends, which show obvious differences. In Robinson & Silk’s semi-analytic formalism, the (1, 0) model gives the lowest galaxy counts, the (0.3, 0.7) lies in between, and the (0.2, 0) one gives the highest galaxy counts. They explained such trends as the result caused by the dominant effects of the different volume element $`dV/dz`$ and the growth factor $`G`$ in different cosmologies. A lower-density universe always has higher $`dV/dz`$ and larger $`G`$, and the combination of these two factors dominates the competing effect of the larger luminosity distance which makes objects fainter in such a universe. On the other hand, Weinberg et al.’s (1, 0) model yields the highest counts, (0.4, 0.6) yields the lowest counts, and (0.4, 0) is in between. Notice that in our approach (1, 0) gives the highest counts, (0.3, 0.7) is in between, and (0.2, 0) gives the lowest counts. It is possible that the reasoning of Robinson & Silk (2000) might only be partially true, and that other effects which they did not consider might actually be important. For example, if the luminosity of $`L^{}`$ galaxies in a high-density universe is brighter than that can be produced from their current model, the number counts in different cosmologies might have a different behavior from that shown in their paper.

## 5 Discussion and Conclusion

### 5.1 The Effect of Luminosity Evolution

The most crucial assumption made in our prediction is that the luminosity evolution from $`z3`$ to 6 is not significant, so that the value of $`L^{}`$ at around restframe 1400Å is still the same at $`z6`$ as at $`z3`$. However, there are several possibilities where this condition could break down. There are at least two major competing effects which are relevant. One possibility is that the merger/star-forming rate could be lower at $`z6`$, and so would bring down the value of $`L^{}`$. On the other hand, both dust extinction and metallicities could be lower at earlier epochs as well, which would make $`L^{}`$ brighter. Since these effects tend to cancel each other out, we believe that to first order our assumption is reasonable. Needless to say, the reality could be more complicated that what we assumed. For example, it has been suggested that $`L^{}`$ evolves mildly in the form $`L^{}(1+z)^\beta `$, where $`\beta `$ varies from $`1`$ to $`1.5`$ ($`e.g.`$ Lanzetta et al. 1999). As described below, the surface density at the bright end is extremely sensitive to the $`L^{}`$ value. Therefore, a direct comparison between this simple prediction, which serves as a first approximation, and any future observations can give quantitative estimates on how the luminosity evolves from $`z3`$ to 6. For the sake of completeness, here we discuss how the possibilities mentioned above would affect our prediction.

The time interval between $`z=3`$ and $`z=6`$ is about 1.28 Gyr in a $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$, and $`H_0=65`$ universe, and is likely only sufficient to allow one major merger ($`cf.`$ Makino & Hut 1997). Hence a higher merger rate alone would at most make $`L^{}`$ at $`z3`$ twice as bright as at $`z6`$. On the other hand, a higher merger rate would certainly make star formation rate higher, and this would further contribute to the luminosity. The later effect, however, has not yet been well quantified. As a very rough estimation, the higher star formation rate could contribute another factor of few in increasing $`L^{}`$ at $`z3`$. Thus the overall effect of merger/star formation rate difference would make $`L^{}`$ at $`z3`$ four to six times as bright as at $`z6`$, or a difference of 1.5–2 mag.

The dust content and metallicities are likely to increase from $`z6`$ to 3, and these would affect $`L^{}`$ in the opposite way. For example, one of the more reddened object in Steidel et al.’s sample, MS 1512-cB58, is quoted having $`E(BV)0.3`$ mag (Pettini et al. 2001). Assuming the extinction law of Calzetti et al. (2000), this number translates to $`A_{1400\AA }2.6`$ mag. This means the galaxies at $`z6`$ could get brighter by 2.6 mag at most, if dust extinction is largely absent at this redshift. The metallicity of galaxies at large redshift is again very hard to quantify and seems to have a wide spread ($`c.f.`$ Nagamine et al. 2001); but in any case, it is not likely that this effect would contribute more than 0.5 mag increase in brightness at $`z6`$ at around rest-frame 1400 Å.

To investigate how the surface density could be affected by the luminosity evolution, we also calculated the surface densities for different $`M^{}`$ values. Specifically, we looked at the limits of the $`M^{}`$ value where the high normalization case starts to conflict with the known constraints, and where the low normalization case begins to be consistent with those constraints. Since $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$ are currently the most widely accepted values, for the sake of simplicity, we will only discuss our (0.3, 0.7) model here. In the high normalization case, if $`M^{}`$ is brighter by more than 0.7 mag at $`z6`$, the predicted counts will conflict with our CTIO upper limit. If $`M^{}`$ is fainter by only 0.3 mag at $`z6`$, on the other hand, the counts will conflict with the lower limit derived from the SDSS QSO hosts by more than a factor of two. In the low normalization case, $`M^{}`$ needs to be brighter by at least 2.0 mag to make the counts consistent with the Keck lower limit. In the mean time, however, such $`M^{}`$ value makes the counts inconsistent with our CTIO upper limit, overpredicting the counts by a factor of two. This situation further confirms that the low normalization case can be rejected.

### 5.2 Summary

We present a simple empirical approach to predict the galaxy surface density at $`z6`$, which $`extrapolates`$ the known luminosity function of $`z3`$ galaxies to $`z6`$. Our approach is based on only two observational results, namely, the observed luminosity function of $`z3`$ Lyman-break galaxies and the number of $`5.5z6.5`$ galaxies in the HDF-N, and the assumption that there is no $`strong`$ luminosity evolution for galaxies from $`z3`$ to $`z6`$. The biggest uncertainty in our estimates comes from the normalization, $`i.e.`$, the actual number density of $`z6`$ galaxies in the HDF-N down to the limit of $`m_{AB}`$ = 27.0 mag, for which we used one per WFPC-2 field and one per NIC-3 field as our low and high normalization, respectively. We checked our results against the constraints derived from all known observations. It seems that the low normalization case can be rejected. The high normalization case, on the other hand, is consistent with most constraints if the prediction is made in the (0.3, 0.7) or (1, 0) models. The only observation with which our predictions do not agree is the narrow-band $`z=5.7`$ $`Ly\alpha `$ emitter result reported by Rhoads & Malhotra (2001), whose number density is at least 5 times higher than our prediction. If their result were used as the normalization, it would suggest that the number of $`z5.5`$ objects in the HDF be at least 6 times as many as actually found. Since these emitters still need future spectroscopic identification to judge their real nature, we conclude that this is only a potential conflict. On the other hand, a direct comparison between our prediction and any future observations can give quantitative estimation on how the luminosity evolves at different epochs, as indicated in the previous section.

To summarize, we believe that our simple approach can be used to plan future surveys, where there will always be compromise between depth and sky coverage. As our prediction indicates, currently the most realistic way to find a significant number of $`z6`$ galaxies with the available ground-based facilities is to do multi-color, medium-depth and wide-field surveys reaching continuum $`m_{AB}24.0`$$`24.5`$ mag from 8400Å to the CCD Q.E. cut-off at around 1$`\mu m`$, and covering a couple of square degrees. There are now several wide-field CCD cameras available at telescopes of sufficient light-gathering power, e.g., the MOSAIC-I/II at the KPNO/CTIO 4m’s, the CFH12K at the CFHT and the Suprime-Cam at the Subaru. Carefully designed surveys at a 4m class telescope could possibly discover a few dozen $`L>L^{}`$ $`z6`$ galaxies within a few nights of observation (Yan et al. 2002, in preparation). On the other hand, deep, pencil-beam surveys from the ground are not likely to be very successful even with 8-10m class telescopes. As Table 1 indicated, pencil-beam surveys with a few square arcmin field of view would have to reach at least $`m_{AB}=27`$ mag in the difficult spectrum regime redder than 8400Å to discover a significant number of such objects. Since at least two bands of observation at similar depth are needed to select drop-out candidates, the telescope time required is very costly if not unrealistic. In the immediate future, it should be possible to use the the Advance Camera for Surveys, which was installed on board HST in Macrh 2002, for drop-out searches to better constrain the luminosity function at $`z6`$. Accessing the faint end of the luminosity function at $`z6`$ will be one of the major goals that we will pursue with the Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST) out to redshifts as high $`z910`$, and possibly beyond.

We are grateful to the anonymous referee for the critical comments. We thank Drs. David Weinberg, Joseph Silk and Xiaohui Fan for helpful discussion. The authors acknowledge support from NSF grant AST-9802963 and RAW acknowledges support from the NGST project. H. Yan thanks support from the Sigma Xi Grants-in-Aid. S. Cohen would like to thank the ASU NASA Space Grant Graduate Fellowship.


text:
# Photometric Light Curve for the Kuiper Belt Object 2000 𝐸𝐵₁₇₃ on 78 Nights

## 1 Introduction

Most searches for Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) scan over small areas of the sky to deep limits, with little chance of discovering the rare-bright objects. Only in the last two years have a number of studies searched wide areas (Ferrin et al., 2001; Larsen et al., 2001; Sheppard et al., 2000; Jewitt, Luu, & Trujillo, 1998). As part of the QUEST KBO Survey ($`66.8deg^2`$ to $`R=20.1`$), we discovered the very bright KBO 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ (Ferrin et al., 2001). This body is one of the largest known KBOs, and the brightest after Pluto.

As a bright source, 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ can provide the best signal-to-noise ratio for a variety of physical observations, including visible and infrared spectroscopy. Our own discovery and initial follow-up photometry (Ferrin et al., 2001) established the red color of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$, typical of many KBOs and attributed to the presence on the surface of organic solids (Cruikshank et al., 1998). Brown, Blake, & Kessler (2000) give a spectrum from 1.4-2.4 $`\mu `$m, Licandro, Oliva, & Di Martino (2001) present a spectrum from 0.9-2.4 $`\mu `$m, and Jewitt & Luu (2001) give a reflectance spectrum from 1.0-2.4 $`\mu `$m. The infrared spectrum of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ is generally featureless although Licandro et al. note strong absorption in the K band. This might be related to highly carbonized materials with a deficiency of hydrogen bonds.

Here, we report the first long-term photometric light curve for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ measured on 78 nights from December 2000 to July 2001 with the Yale 1-meter telescope at Cerro Tololo Observatory. The data reveal a prominent opposition surge, which is a significant increase in brightness within a few degrees of zero phase. The effect is commonly observed for the moon, asteroids, and satellites of planets in the outer solar system (Gehrels, 1956), and has been attributed both to the sudden disappearance of shadows cast by regolith particles and to coherent backscattering by particle aggregates (Shkuratov & Helfenstein, 2001; Hapke, 1993). For the high-albedo icy satellites in the outer solar system, laboratory investigations suggest that coherent backscattering may play a dominant role (Nelson et al., 1998). For the well-studied asteroids in the main belt, the shape of the phase curve is known to correlate with spectral type and albedo (Belskaya & Shevchenko, 2000; Helfenstein, 1989; Bowell & Lume, 1999). In this paper we compare the phase curve we observe for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ with model predictions and with other solar system bodies to place constraints on the likely composition and surface properties.

## 2 Observations

We made all our photometric observations of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ with the Yale 1-m telescope at Cerro Tololo operated by the YALO consortium (Mendez, Depoy, & Bailyn, 1998; Bailyn et al., 1999). As observations with this telescope are queue-scheduled by a resident operator, this mode is well suited for secular observations. This capability and the accessibility of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ at our modest aperture provided an opportunity to obtain the first long-term light curve of a KBO (other than Pluto) with fine time resolution.

All our data are from the ANDICAM CCD camera (Mendez, Depoy, & Bailyn, 1998). The array has $`2048\times 2048`$ pixels, each $`0.29\mathrm{}`$ square. The read noise is 11 $`e^{}`$ on average, and we operated at a gain of $`3.6e^{}ADU^1`$. All our exposures were of 300 second duration. Our typical seeing condition resulted in a FWHM of $`1.5\mathrm{}`$ (5 pixels). With a maximum apparent motion for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ of $`99\mathrm{}day^1`$, the trailing was less than 1.2 pixel. A detailed calculation shows that this trailing results in a negligible systematic photometric error (under 0.001 mag for our 5 pixel radius photometry aperture).

Our observations of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ cover 225 days from JD 2451890 (11 December 2000) to JD 2452115 (24 July 2001). We discarded 29 images because the image fell on a bad column, a cosmic ray hit, or a background star. In all, we obtained 214 useable images on 78 separate nights. Of these, 185 are in the Johnson R-band with a fairly even distribution across our observing interval, while 29 are in the Johnson V-band with all but one of these taken before JD 2451942 (1 February 2001). By averaging repeated measurements taken within 15 minutes on the same night, and weighting inversely by the estimated variance, we obtain 77 R-band and 28 V-band magnitudes. They are listed in Table I with 1-sigma errors and are plotted in Figure 1 versus observation date. For each observation Table I also gives the heliocentric Julian Date of the middle of the exposure(s) and the solar phase angle $`\alpha `$, derived using the JPL/Horizons program at http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/.

Our method for measuring the magnitudes and determining their uncertainties follows the standard techniques in CCD photometry. We used IRAF programs (ZEROCOMBINE, FLATCOMBINE, CCDPROC) to determine mean bias and flat fields (from five bias frames and domes flats taken at the start of each observing night) and to make bias and flat field corrections for each image. We used IRAF program PHOT to measure the flux of objects within apertures of radii 10 pixels for absolute photometry and within radii of 5 pixels for relative photometry. For each object we determined the sky background as the mode of the flux distribution within an annulus of inner and outer diameters 15 and 30 pixels.

Our calibration procedure consisted of three steps. In the first, we analyzed images of Landolt photometric standard stars (Landolt, 1992) taken on eight photometric nights. Typically 29 stars were observed on each night with airmasses ranging from 1.15 to 1.7. For each night we fit Landolt’s catalogued magnitudes for these stars to a linear function of the instrumental magnitudes, the V R colors were measured, and corrected for their airmass at the time of observation. The standard deviations for these fits range from 0.010 to 0.030 mag (with a median of 0.015 mag), this being a measure of our systematic uncertainties.

Our second step was to determine the R- and V-band magnitudes of many comparison stars near to the path of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$. We chose 151 stars such that every image of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ included nine comparison stars on average. Their magnitudes range from 14 to 18, yielding images with large signals but not saturated. The stars appear in 19 fields, each of which we recorded with 180-second exposures in both the R and V bands on the same nights that we observed the Landolt stars. Using our fits to the Landolt magnitudes, we determined the V and R magnitudes of the comparison stars given their airmass and instrumental V and R magnitudes. The resulting comparison star magnitudes are accurate to approximately 0.01 mag.

Our third calibration step was to determine the R and V magnitudes of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ using aperture corrections, thus minimizing the contribution of the sky background to the noise in each measurement. For each usable image of the object, we first measured its instrumental magnitude using a 5-pixel radius aperture. We then converted this result to a measurement within a 10-pixel radius aperture by adding the median difference between the 5- and 10-pixel instrumental magnitudes for nearby bright comparison stars. Finally, we determine the R-band or V-band magnitude for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ from its corresponding 10-pixel instrumental magnitude by adding the median difference between calibrated and instrumental magnitudes for the comparison stars appearing in the same image.

The dominant uncertainty in our resulting measurements for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ is the uncertainty from the flux measurements within the 5-pixel apertures which is typically 0.04 to 0.08 mag. On most of our nights, the R-band images were taken as pairs (from JD 2451890 to JD 2451942) or as triples (from JD 2451954 to JD 2452115) in quick succession. The errors after combining the resulting flux measurements as weighted averages, which generally range from 0.02 to 0.05 mag., as shown in Table I.

We have checked our determinations of these errors in two ways. First, we have many multiple measures of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ that are nearly simultaneous. Their differences (in units of the combined one-sigma uncertainty) have an RMS scatter of 0.98, implying that our individual error bars are accurate. Second, we have produced magnitudes for eight check stars (with magnitudes close to that of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$) using the same procedures we used for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$. Fitting constant light curves to each of the stars we find the total chi-square to be 172 for 164 degrees of freedom. The reduced chi-square is near unity, so we conclude that our method for deriving the uncertainties is valid.

For the purposes of studying the long-term variability of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$, we have calculated the 5-day average magnitudes and errors shown in Table II and plotted in Figure 2 as a function of solar phase angle $`\alpha `$. We computed the magnitudes from the R-band data in Table I for each successive five-day intervals starting at JD 2451890. For each average magnitude, Table II also shows the average Julian date and solar phase angle for each 5-day average. We corrected the observed magnitudes (R) for the changing geocentric distance of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ ($`\mathrm{\Delta }`$) using $`R_{OPP}=5\mathrm{log}_{10}(\mathrm{\Delta }/28.76)`$ where $`R_{OPP}`$ is the R-band magnitude corrected to the opposition distance. The geocentric distance of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ changed from 30.31 AU at the start of our observations to 28.76 AU at opposition, for a correction of up to 0.11 mag. The heliocentric distance of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ varies from 29.80 AU to 29.70 AU over our interval of observation, resulting in a totally negligible correction of 0.007 mag.

## 3 Analysis

The light curve for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ shown in Figure 1 has a prominent peak at JD $`2452010\pm 10`$ that is broad, symmetrical, and that coincides with the date of opposition on JD 2452010 (with $`\alpha =0.28\mathrm{°}`$). There are also two minima at JD $`2451915\pm 10`$ and $`2452100\pm 10`$, each coinciding with the respective times of maximum phase on JD 2451922 and 2452102 (with $`\alpha `$ equal $`1.89\mathrm{°}`$ and $`1.96\mathrm{°}`$, respectively). These coincidences clearly suggest that the brightness variations we observe for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ are phase dependent, and the result of a significant opposition surge.

The phase curve for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ plotted in Figure 2 shows that this opposition surge is linear over the observable range of phase. A least-squares fit yields $`R_{OPP}=19.083+0.125\alpha `$. The one-sigma uncertainties in the constant and phase coefficient are $`\pm 0.005`$ mag and $`\pm 0.009magdeg^1`$. Because the reduced chi-square for this linear fit is close to unity ($`\chi ^2=1.10`$), there is no justification for fitting a more complicated model for the phase function (e.g., a curve or a broken line). Correcting the unbinned data from Table I to opposition distance and again fitting a linear phase function also yields a reduced chi-square close to unity (1.31). At this finer resolution the RMS scatter about a linear fit is 0.059 mag, while the average uncertainty of the input magnitudes is 0.048 mag.

In terms of the parameters introduced by (Hapke, 1993) to characterize the phase functions of various solar system bodies, our observations of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ provide significant constraints. We have fit the phase curve with Hapke’s integral phase function for the opposition surge component, which to first order in $`\alpha `$ is proportional to $`[1.0+B(\alpha )]p(\alpha )1.0`$, where $`p(\alpha )`$ is the phase function for a single particle and $`B(\alpha )B(0)[1.0+(1/h)\mathrm{tan}(\alpha /2)]1`$. Here $`B(\alpha )`$ describes an opposition surge of amplitude $`B(0)`$ and angular half-width $`h/2`$ radians. Values for $`B(0)<1`$ are expected for surges resulting solely from shadow-hiding, whereas values exceeding unity may occur due to coherent backscattering. For our small angular range of $`\alpha `$, $`p(\alpha )`$ is very close to one, so then the opposition surge component will be $`B(\alpha )`$ and the total reflected intensity will scale as $`1+B(\alpha )`$. In magnitudes, $`R=R_02.5\mathrm{log}_{10}\{[1+B(\alpha )]/[1+B(0)]\}`$, where $`R_0`$ is the magnitude at zero phase. Given the narrow phase range of our observations, we are not able to constrain either the albedo or the surface roughness, which enter into Hapke’s expressions at higher orders in $`\alpha `$.

Our best fit yields $`h=0.050`$ radians ($`2.9\mathrm{°}`$), $`B(0)=4.7`$, and $`R_0=19.07`$; with a chi-square of 37.6 for 35 degrees-of-freedom. From a Monte Carlo analysis of our observations, we derive a one-sigma uncertainties $`\pm 0.015`$ rad for $`h`$, -3 and +2 for $`B(0)`$, and $`\pm 0.02`$ mag for $`R_0`$.

We have many virtually simultaneous V-band and R-band measurements, so we can look for variations in the V R color. The average V R color is $`0.63\pm 0.03`$ from JD 2451893 to JD 2451923 (phase $`1.678\mathrm{°}1.893\mathrm{°}`$), $`0.63\pm 0.02`$ from JD 2451927 to JD 2451942 (phase $`1.883\mathrm{°}1.767\mathrm{°}`$), and $`0.62\pm 0.07`$ for JD 2452030 (phase $`0.745\mathrm{°}`$). Thus we find no evidence for any fast or slow variations. The final V R color for all nights combined as a weighted average is $`0.63\pm 0.02`$ mag. This agrees with $`\mathrm{V R}=0.57\pm 0.05`$ determined by Ferrin et al. (2001) from earlier observations.

Because the V R color for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ appears constant, our observations alone reveal no significant difference between the V-band and R-band phase curves. Including the V R observations presented by Ferrin et al. (2001) and Jewitt & Luu (2001) we can refine this constraint. In Table 3, we have collected all available V R measures for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$. Our chi-square fit to these data yields a V R phase curve with slope $`0.03\pm 0.04magdeg^1`$. This slope differs by less than one sigma from zero, so that again we find no significant color dependence for the opposition surge. Adding this marginally non-zero coefficient to our R-band phase coefficient of $`0.125\pm 0.009magdeg^1`$, we obtain a V-band phase coefficient of $`0.155\pm 0.041magdeg^1`$.

## 4 Implications

One of the primary goals of our long-term study of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ is to determine its rotation period. However, we see no significant photometric modulations other than the ordinary phase function with its opposition surge. Quantitatively, this is shown by the fit of nightly R magnitudes (see Table 1) having a reduced chi-square near unity. However, it is possible that 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ has a very low amplitude modulation, and this might be shown by the nightly scatter about the phase function (0.059 mag) being slightly above the average one-sigma error bar (0.048 mag). If this difference is ascribed to rotational modulation, then the peak-to-peak amplitude cannot be larger than 0.097 mag. The error bars are too large to have any real hope of finding a significant periodicity with only 77 data points spread out over 225 nights.

The lack of a rotational modulation is not surprising, as by our count from the literature (Farnham, 2001a, b; Gutiérrez, 2001; Davies et al., 1998; Sheppard & Jewitt, 2002, for example), roughly 32 KBOs and Centaurs have been checked for variability and this has yielded only 14 known rotational periods. A flat rotational light curve could be due to 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ being viewed pole-on or due to its being nearly round and without large regional albedo differences.

The absence of any significant rotational variability and the bright appearance of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ relative to other KBOs has allowed us to measure the object’s phase curve, the first for any KBO other than Pluto (Rabinowitz & Schaefer, 2001). In Figure 2, we compare the phase curve to planet Pluto (the largest known KBO), outer solar-system satellites Rhea, Nereid, and Titania, and also to the dark main-belt asteroid (24) Themis. These examples have been chosen because they span the range of small-angle phase curves that have been well measured for bodies that might have surfaces similar to 2000 $`EB_{173}`$. Nereid is particularly interesting because it might be a captured KBO (Schaefer & Schaefer, 1995, 2000) and because it also exhibits a prominent opposition surge (Schaefer & Tourtellotte, 2001).

It is apparent that 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ has an opposition surge with a slope intermediate in amplitude among the comparisons in Figure 2. (This is also confirmed by comparing $`V_{OPP}(0\mathrm{°})V_{OPP}(2\mathrm{°})=0.31`$ with the tabulated values in Table II of Schaefer & Tourtellotte (2001).) The surge is much steeper than for Pluto, Rhea, and most main-belt asteroids, but not as steep as the surges observed for Nereid and Titania. Unlike these two satellites which have narrow opposition surges, 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ also has a wide surge comparable to Rhea and (24) Themis. Strong and narrow opposition surges have also been measured for particulate materials of high albedo, for which the cause is attributed to coherent backscatter (Nelson et al., 1998, 2000). It is thus possible that the influence of coherent backscatter is modest for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ in comparison with Nereid and Titania. This might also indicate a relatively low albedo for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$. However, because the high-albedo surfaces of Pluto and Rhea (0.6) have even weaker opposition surges, this conclusion can not be drawn. Owing to the intermediate slope of the opposition surge in 2000 $`EB_{173}`$, the comparison with Nereid does not allow any confident conclusion concerning the possibility that Nereid is a captured KBO.

Despite the relatively broad opposition surge for 2000 $`EB_{173}`$, the large amplitude that we derive ($`B(0)>1.7`$ with 84% confidence) shows that coherent backscattering is likely an important influence. This can be tested by looking for a wavelength dependence to the width of the opposition surge, $`h`$. For shadow-hiding, there is no wavelength dependence. For coherent-backscattering, $`h`$ scale linearly with wavelength of observation (Hapke, 1993). Our R-band observations yield $`h=0.050`$ rad. For the V-band, we should therefore expect $`h=0.050\times (5500\AA /7000\AA )=0.039`$ rad if coherent-backscattering is the dominant cause, and $`h=0.050`$ rad if shadow-hiding is dominant.. Unfortunately, our observations are not sufficiently precise to measure this small difference. However, in the near future, a simple measure of the $`BI`$ or $`BR`$ color at opposition can be compared with the $`BI=1.97\pm 0.13`$ mag and $`BR=1.59\pm 0.13`$ mag reported for a phase of $`1.73\mathrm{°}`$ (Ferrin et al., 2001) or $`BI=2.17\pm 0.05`$ mag and $`BR=1.58\pm 0.04`$ mag reported for a phase of $`1.93\mathrm{°}`$ (Jewitt & Luu, 2001). This comparison could provide a decisive test between shadow hiding and coherent backscattering.

## 5 Conclusions

We measured 77 R-band and 28 V-band magnitudes of 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ on 78 nights over a 225 day interval centered on its 2001 opposition. We find that the light curve varies from $`R_{OPP}=19.11`$ to $`19.39`$, with all the changes fully described by a linear phase function with $`R_{OPP}=19.083+0.125\alpha `$. This is the first opposition surge measured for any KBO (other than Pluto). The amplitude of any rotational modulation is small, with a peak-to-peak amplitude of less than 0.097 mag. The V R color is constant at $`0.63\pm 0.02`$ mag. At opposition (with $`\alpha =0.28\mathrm{°}`$), 2000 $`EB_{173}`$ is the brightest known KBO with $`R=19.11`$ mag.

We are able to fit the R-band phase curve assuming a Hapke-type opposition surge with width $`h=0.050`$ and amplitude $`B(0)>1.7`$. This is relatively broad compared to Nereid, and does not offer confirmation that Nereid could be a captured KBO. The large amplitude of the surge, however, indicates the coherent backscattering may be important. Our measurements of the phase curve in the V-band are not accurate enough to distinguish between shadow hiding and coherent backscattering. Future measures of the $`BI`$ or $`BR`$ color near opposition could determine the physical cause of the opposition surge.