Lyman-alpha Emitters in Ionized Bubbles: Constraining the Environment and Ionized Fraction

Understand

Lyman-alpha emitters (LAEs) are excellent probes of the reionization process, as they must be surrounded by large ionized bubbles in order to be visible during the reionization era.

• Large ionized regions are thought to correspond to over-dense regions and may be protoclusters, making them interesting test-beds for early massive structures.
• Close associations containing several LAEs are often assumed to mark over-dense, ionized bubbles.
• Here, we develop the first framework to quantify the ionization and density fields of high-z galaxy associations.