Search

We report the results of a survey for HI 21-cm absorption at z < 0.4 in a new sample of radio sources with the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope. Of the 11 sources for which there are good data, we obtain zero detections, where four are expected upon accounting for the ionising photon rates and sensitivity. Adding these to the previously published values, we confirm that the non-detection of 21-cm absorption in active sources at high redshift is due to photo-ionisation of the gas rather than excitation by 21-cm photons (significant at 6.09 sigma and 2.90 sigma, respectively). We also confirm a strong correlation between the absorption strength and the reddening of the source, suggesting that dust plays a significant role in shielding the gas from the ambient ultra-violet field. An anti-correlation between the 21-cm detection rate and the radio turnover frequency is also found, which runs contrary to what is expected on the basis that the higher the turnover frequency, the more compact the source. It is, however, consistent with the hypothesis that the turnover frequency is related to the electron density, supported by a correlation between the turnover frequency and ionising photon rate., Comment: Accepted by MNRAS

We report on a survey for associated HI 21-cm and OH 18-cm absorption with the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope at redshifts z = 0.2-0.4. Although the low redshift selection ensures that our targets are below the critical ultra-violet luminosity, which is hypothesised to ionise all of the neutral gas in the host galaxy, we do not obtain any detections in the six sources searched. Analysing these in context of the previous surveys, in addition to the anti-correlation with the ultra-violet luminosity (ionising photon rate), we find a correlation between the strength of the absorption and the blue -- near-infrared colour, as well as the radio-band turnover frequency. We believe that these are due to the photo-ionisation of the neutral gas, an obscured sight-line being more conducive to the presence of cold gas and the compact radio emission being better intercepted by the absorbing gas, maximising the flux coverage, respectively. Regarding the photo-ionisation, the compilation of the previous surveys increases the significance of the critical ionising photon rate, above which all of the gas in the host galaxy is hypothesised to be ionised, to >5 sigma. This reaffirms that this is an ubiquitous effect, which has profound implications for the detection of neutral gas in these objects with the Square Kilometre Array., Comment: Accepted by MNRAS

We present the results of a survey for HI 21-cm and OH 18-cm absorption in seven strong CO emitters at z > 3. Despite reaching limits comparable to those required to detect 21-cm absorption at lower redshifts, we do not detect either transition in any of the objects searched. We believe that this is due to the high redshift selection causing all of our targets to have ultra-violet luminosities above the critical value, where all of the atomic gas in the host galaxy disk is suspected to be ionised. However, not only are all of our targets bright in CO emission, but detection of CO above the critical UV luminosity is generally not uncommon. This suggests that the molecular gas is shielded from the radiation or is physically remote from the source of the continuum emission, as it appears to be from CO observations of high redshift radio galaxies., Comment: 12 pages, accepted by MNRAS

The intra-cluster medium contains cosmic rays and magnetic fields that are manifested through the large scale synchrotron sources, termed as radio halos, relics and mini-halos. The Extended Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT) Radio Halo Survey (EGRHS) is an extension of the GMRT Radio Halo Survey (GRHS) designed to search for radio halos using GMRT 610/235 MHz observations. The GRHS+EGRHS consists of 64 clusters in the redshift range 0.2 -- 0.4 that have an X-ray luminosity larger than 5x10^44 erg/s in the 0.1 -- 2.4 keV band and with declinations > -31 deg in the REFLEX and eBCS X-ray cluster catalogues. In this second paper in the series, GMRT 610/235 MHz data on the last batch of 11 galaxy clusters and the statistical analysis of the full sample are presented. A new mini-halo in RXJ2129.6+0005 and candidate diffuse sources in Z5247, A2552 and Z1953 are discovered. A unique feature of this survey are the upper limits on the detections of 1 Mpc sized radio halos; 4 new are presented here making a total of 31 in the survey. Of the sample, 58 clusters that have adequately sensitive radio information were used to obtain the most accurate occurrence fractions so far. The occurrence of radio halos in our X-ray selected sample is ~22%, that of mini-halos is 13% and that of relics is ~5%. The radio power - X-ray luminosity diagrams for the radio halos and mini-halos with the detections and upper limits are presented. The morphological estimators namely, centroid shift (w), concentration parameter (c) and power ratios (P_3/P_0) derived from the Chandra X-ray images are used as proxies for the dynamical states of the GRHS+EGRHS clusters. The clusters with radio halos and mini-halos occupy distinct quadrants in the c-w, c-P_3/P_0 and w - P_3/P_0 planes, corresponding to the more and less morphological disturbance, respectively. The non-detections span both the quadrants., Comment: 24 pages, 5 tables, 25 figures, accepted for publication in A&A