The Lyman Continuum Escape Fraction of Emission Line-selected z similar to 2.5 Galaxies Is Less Than 15%

• Recent work suggests that strong emission line, star-forming galaxies (SFGs) may be significant Lyman continuum leakers. We combine archival Hubble Space Telescope broadband ultraviolet and optical imaging (F275W and F606W, respectively) with emission line catalogs derived from WFC3 IR G141 grism spectroscopy to search for escaping Lyman continuum (LyC) emission from homogeneously selected z similar to 2.5 SFGs. We detect no escaping Lyman continuum from SFGs selected on [O II] nebular emission (N = 208) and, within a narrow redshift range, on [O III]/[O II]. We measure 1 sigma upper limits to the LyC escape fraction relative to the non-ionizing UV continuum from [O II] emitters, f(esc) less than or similar to 5.6%, and strong [O III]/[O II] > 5 ELGs, f(esc) less than or similar to 14.0%. Our observations are not deep enough to detect f(esc) similar to 10% typical of low-redshift Lyman continuum emitters. However, we find that this population represents a small fraction of the star-forming galaxy population at z similar to 2. Thus, unless the number of extreme emission line galaxies grows substantially to z greater than or similar to 6, such galaxies may be insufficient for reionization. Deeper survey data in the rest-frame ionizing UV will be necessary to determine whether strong line ratios could be useful for pre-selecting LyC leakers at high redshift.

Ämnesord

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Fysik -- Astronomi, astrofysik och kosmologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Physical Sciences -- Astronomy, Astrophysics and Cosmology (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

galaxies: general

galaxies: star formation

ultraviolet: galaxies

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