The origin of strong nebular HeII emission at low and high redshift

• Applicant: Privatdozent Dr. Dominik Bomans
• Subject Area: Astrophysics and Astronomy
• Term: from 2017 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 386864749

Recent observations of high redshift show very high ionized nebular lines Similar lines are extremely rare in low redshift galaxies and there mostly connected to hot, evolved Wolf-Rayet stars. Now it appears that a very small number of localgalaxies exist, which show such highly ionized nebular lines without signatures of Wolf-Rayet stars. We propose to study these potential local analogs to the highly ionized young galaxies in order to better understand the ionization mechanisms of these lines. This will allow to clarify, if the observed high-ionization lines in some high redshift starbursts (proto-)galaxies are indeed created by the radiation field of extremely metal-poor, very massive stars.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants