Formation and Evolution of Galaxies: Observations in Infrared and other Wavelengths

    General
    Description

    This IAC research group carries out several extragalactic projects in different spectral ranges, using space as well as ground-based telescopes, to study the cosmological evolution of galaxies and the origin of nuclear activity in active galaxies. The group is a member of the international consortium which built the SPIRE instrument for the Herschel Space Observatory and of the European consortium which is developing the SAFARI instrument for the infrared space telescope SPICA of the space agencies ESA and JAXA.

    The main projects in 2018 were:

    a) High-redshift galaxies and quasars with far-infrared emission discovered with the Herschel Space Observatory in the HerMES and Herschel-ATLAS Key Projects.

    b) Sloan Digital Sky Survey IV: BELLS GALLERY galaxies and very luminous Lyman alpha emitting galaxies.

    c) Participation in the development of the SAFARI instrument, one of the European contributions to the SPICA infrared space telescope.

    d) Discovery of the most distant individual star ever observed, in one of the fields of the "HST Frontier Fields".

    e) Search for supernovae in distant, gravitationally lensed galaxies.

    f) Several studies with GTC of absorption line systems in the line of sight to red quasars.

    Principal investigator
    Project staff
    Dr.
    Stefan Geier
    Collaborators
    Herschel SPIRE, HerMES, Herschel-ATLAS, SPICA, SAFARI, BELLS GALLERY, SERVS, DEEPDRILL, SDSS-IV y SHARDS Frontier Fields
    1. Marques-Chaves et al. (2018) present a study of the submillimeter galaxy HLock01 at z = 2.9574, one of the brightest gravitationally lensed sources discovered in the Herschel Multi-tiered Extragalactic Survey. Detailed analysis of the high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) rest-frame UV GTC OSIRIS spectrum shows complex kinematics of the gas.
    2. Rigopoulou et al. (2018) using new, Herschel spectroscopic observations of key far-infrared fine structure lines of the z 3 galaxy HLSW-01 derive gas-phase metallicities and find that the metallicities of z 3 submm-luminous galaxies are consistent with solar metallicities and that they appear to follow the mass–metallicity relation expected for z 3 systems.
    3. Cornachione et al. (2018) present a morphological study of 17 lensed Lyα emitter (LAE) galaxies of the BELLS GALLERY sample. The analysis combines the magnification effect of strong galaxy–galaxy lensing with the high resolution of the Hubble Space Telescope to achieve a physical resolution of ~80 pc for this 2 < z < 3 LAE sample.
    4. Oteo et al. (2018) report the identification of an extreme protocluster of galaxies in the early universe whose core (nicknamed Distant Red Core, DRC, because of its very red color in Herschel SPIRE bands) is formed by at least 10 dusty star-forming galaxies (DSFGs), spectroscopically confirmed to lie at z = 4.002 via detection of emission lines with ALMA and ATCA.
    5. Kelly et al. (2018) report the discovery of an individual star, Icarus, at redshift z = 1.49 magnified by more than × 2,000 by gravitational lensing of the galaxy cluster MACS J1149+222. Icarus is located in a spiral galaxy that is so far from Earth that its light has taken 9000 million years to reach the Earth.

    Related publications

    Witnessing the Violent, Merger-driven Formation of an Extremely Massive Galaxy 1.7 Gyr after the Big Bang 2025ApJ...994...57P
    An ALMA Band 7 survey of SDSS/Herschel quasars in Stripe 82: I. The properties of the 870 micron counterparts 2025A&A...702A.183H
    Aligned, Multiple-transient Events in the First Palomar Sky Survey 2025PASP..137j4504V
    The ambiguous AT2022rze: changing-look AGN mimicking a supernova in a merging galaxy system 2025MNRAS.542.3354P
    AT2022sxl: A Candidate Repeating Tidal Disruption Event in Possible Association with Two High-energy Neutrino Events 2025ApJ...991...20J
    MIRACLE: I. Unveiling the multi-phase, multi-scale physical properties of the active galaxy NGC 424 with MIRI, MUSE, and ALMA 2025A&A...701A.113M
    EP241021a: A Months-duration X-Ray Transient with Luminous Optical and Radio Emission 2025ApJ...990L..29S
    Asteroid sizes determined with thermophysical model and stellar occultations 2025A&A...698A.298C
    Spatially resolved dust properties over 50 kpc in a hyperluminous galaxy merger at z = 4.6 2025A&A...695L..15F
    Multiwavelength analysis of AT 2023sva: a luminous orphan afterglow with evidence for a structured jet 2025MNRAS.538..351S
    The Assembly of Supermassive Black Holes at z &lt; 1 in Early-type Galaxies from Scaling Relations 2025ApJ...981...71F
    Eruptive mass loss less than a year before the explosion of superluminous supernovae: I. The cases of SN 2020xga and SN 2022xgc 2025A&A...694A.292G
    The conceptual design of the 50-meter Atacama Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope (AtLAST) 2025A&A...694A.142M
    LensWatch. II. Improved Photometry and Time-delay Constraints on the Strongly Lensed Type Ia Supernova 2022qmx ("SN Zwicky") with Hubble Space Telescope Template Observations 2025ApJ...980..172L
    The wide binary frequency of metal-poor stars 2025A&A...694A.129L
    Detection of binary companions below the diffraction limit with lucky imaging 2025A&A...694A..48C
    Basaltic quasi-mini-moon: Characterizing 2024 PT<SUB>5</SUB> with the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias and the Two-meter Twin Telescope 2025A&A...694L...5D
    Atacama Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope (AtLAST) science: Probing the transient and time-variable sky 2025ORE.....4..132O
    Unveiling dust, molecular gas, and high star-formation efficiency in extremely UV bright star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 2.1–3.6 2025A&A...693A..17D
    Spectroscopic analysis of the strongly lensed SN Encore: constraints on cosmic evolution of Type Ia supernovae 2024MNRAS.535.2939D
    A spectroscopic and kinematic survey of fast hot subdwarfs 2024A&A...690A.368G
    A targeted search for strongly lensed supernovae with the Las Cumbres Observatory 2024MNRAS.534.1077C
    The Nature of 500 micron Risers III: a small complete sample 2024MNRAS.533.4045C
    Evidence for very massive stars in extremely UV-bright star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 2.2-3.6 2024A&A...686A.185U
    SN 2020pvb: A Type IIn-P supernova with a precursor outburst 2024A&A...686A..13E
    Lensed Type Ia Supernova "Encore" at z = 2: The First Instance of Two Multiply Imaged Supernovae in the Same Host Galaxy 2024ApJ...967L..37P
    JWST Photometric Time-delay and Magnification Measurements for the Triply Imaged Type Ia "SN H0pe" at z = 1.78 2024ApJ...967...50P
    A dusty protocluster surrounding the binary galaxy HerBS-70 at z = 2.3 2024MNRAS.530.4578B
    The NOEMA observations of GN-z11: constraining the neutral interstellar medium and dust formation in the heart of cosmic reionization at z = 10.6 2024MNRAS.530..340F
    Absence of radio-bright dominance in a near-infrared selected sample of red quasars 2024A&A...683A.157V
    Dynamics of 2023 FW<SUB>14</SUB>, the second L<SUB>4</SUB> Mars trojan, and a physical characterization using the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias 2024A&A...683L..14D
    Photometric and colorimetric studies of target objects using small and medium-size telescopes 2024CoSka..54b.205G
    Characterization of Herschel-selected strong lens candidates through HST and sub-mm/mm observations 2024MNRAS.528.6222B
    Photometry of the Didymos System across the DART Impact Apparition 2024PSJ.....5...35M
    z-GAL: A NOEMA spectroscopic redshift survey of bright Herschel galaxies. I. Overview (Corrigendum) 2024A&A...681C...1C
    Detailed spectrophotometric analysis of the superluminous and fast evolving SN 2019neq 2024MNRAS.527.6473F
    The black widow pulsar J1641+8049 in the optical, radio, and X-rays 2024MNRAS.527.4563K
    A bright triple transient that vanished within 50 min 2024MNRAS.527.6312S
    A magnified compact galaxy at redshift 9.51 with strong nebular emission lines 2023Sci...380..416W
    Scaling slowly rotating asteroids with stellar occultations 2023A&A...679A..60M