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Paper: Search for a Relationship Between Galaxies and the Local Lyα Forest: First Results
Volume: 240, Gas and Galaxy Evolution: A Conference in Honor of the 20th Anniversary of the VLA
Page: 74
Authors: McLin, K. M.; Stocke, J. T.; Penton, S. V.; Weymann, R. J.; van Gorkom, J. H.
Abstract: We present preliminary results from our pencil-beam galaxy redshift survey toward bright active galactic nuclei (AGN) observed with HST GHRS/STIS. The AGN observed have been chosen to be nearby enough, z <≈0.1, so that we can observe even very faint dwarf galaxies, MB~-16, between us and them. Our HST survey probes absorbers down to NHI~1012.5 cm-2, comparable to the lowest column densities observed at high redshift. The purpose of our galaxy survey is to study what relationship, if any, exists between the nearby Lyα clouds discovered in our HST absorber survey and galaxies along the lines-of-sight to the AGN. In particular, we wish to test the hypothesis that the Lyα forest is composed of extended galaxy halos. Our preliminary analysis seems to rule this out for the vast majority of absorbers. We see evidence that some of the absorbers are associated with the larger scale galaxy distribution.
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