The [CII] 158 micron line emission in high-redshift galaxies

Understand

The [CII] fine structure transition at 158 microns is the dominant cooling line of cool interstellar gas, and is the brightest of emission lines from star forming galaxies from FIR through meter wavelengths.

• With the advent of ALMA and NOEMA, capable of detecting [CII]-line emission in high-redshift galaxies, there has been a growing interest in using the [CII] line as a probe of the physical conditions of the gas in galaxies, and as a SFR indicator at z>4.
• In this paper, we use a semi-analytical model of galaxy evolution (G.A.S.) combined with the code CLOUDY to predict the [CII] luminosity of a large number of galaxies at 4< z<8.
• At such high redshift, the CMB represents a strong background and we discuss its effects on the luminosity of the [CII] line.