Near-Infrared Colors of Submillimeter-selected Galaxies

February 2004 • 2004AJ....127..728F

Authors • Frayer, D. T. • Reddy, N. A. • Armus, L. • Blain, A. W. • Scoville, N. Z. • Smail, Ian

Abstract • We report on deep near-infrared (NIR) observations of submillimeter-selected galaxies (SMGs) with the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRC) on the Keck I telescope. We have identified K-band candidate counterparts for 12 out of 15 sources in the SCUBA Cluster Lens Survey. Three SMGs remain nondetections with K-band limits of K>23 mag, corrected for lensing. Compensating for lensing, we find a median magnitude of K=22+/-1 mag for the SMG population, but the range of NIR flux densities spans more than a factor of 400. For SMGs with confirmed counterparts based on accurate positions from radio, CO, and/or millimeter continuum interferometric observations, the median NIR color is J-K=2.6+/-0.6 mag. The NIR-bright SMGs (K<19 mag) have colors of J-K~=2 mag, while the faint SMGs tend to be extremely red in the NIR (J-K>3 mag). We argue that a color selection criterion of J-K>~3 mag can be used to help identify counterparts of SMGs that are undetected at optical and radio wavelengths. The number density of sources with J-K>3 mag is 5 arcmin^-2 at K<22.5 mag, greater than that of SMGs with S(850 μm)>2 mJy. It is not clear if the excess represents less luminous infrared-bright galaxies with S(850 μm)<~2 mJy, or if the faint extremely red NIR galaxies represent a different population of sources that could be spatially related to the SMGs.

Links

• SIMBAD http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbo.pl?bibcode=2004AJ....127..728F
• PDF https://stacks.iop.org/1538-3881/127/728/pdf
• NED https://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/uri/NED::InRefcode/2004AJ....127..728F
• PREPRINT http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0310656
• ELECTR https://doi.org/10.1086%2F380943
• SPIRES http://inspirehep.net/search?p=find+eprint+astro-ph/0310656