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Following the success of the Plateau de Bure high-z Blue Sequence Survey (PHIBSS), we present the PHIBSS2 legacy program, a survey of the molecular gas properties of star-forming galaxies on and around the star-formation main sequence (MS) at different redshifts using IRAM's NOrthern Extended Millimeter Array (NOEMA). This survey significantly extends the existing sample of star-forming galaxies with CO molecular gas measurements, probing the peak epoch of star formation (z = 1 − 1.6) as well as its building-up (z = 2 − 3) and winding-down (z = 0.5 − 0.8) phases. The targets are drawn from the well-studied GOODS, COSMOS, and AEGIS cosmological deep fields and uniformly sample the MS in the stellar mass (M⋆) – star formation rate (SFR) plane with log(M⋆/M⊙) = 10 − 11.8 and SFR = 3.5 − 500 M⊙ yr−1 without morphological selection, thus providing a statistically meaningful census of star-forming galaxies at different epochs. We describe the survey strategy and sample selection before focusing on the results obtained at redshift z = 0.5 − 0.8, where we report 60 CO(2-1) detections out of 61 targets. We determine molecular gas masses between 2 × 109 and 5 × 1010 M⊙ and separately obtain disc sizes and bulge-to-total (B/T) luminosity ratios from HST I-band images. The median molecular gas-to-stellar mass ratio μgas∼ = 0.28 ± 0.04 μ gas ∼ = 0.28 ± 0.04 $ \widetilde{\mu_{\mathrm{gas}}} = 0.28 \pm 0.04 $ , gas fraction fgas∼ = 0.22 ± 0.02 f gas ∼ = 0.22 ± 0.02 $ \widetilde{f_{\mathrm{gas}}} = 0.22 \pm 0.02 $ , and depletion time t depl ∼ = 0.84 ± 0.07 Gyr $ \widetilde{t_{\mathrm{depl}}} = 0.84 \pm 0.07\,\mathrm{Gyr} $ as well as their dependence with stellar mass and offset from the MS follow published scaling relations for a much larger sample of galaxies spanning a significantly wider range of redshifts, the cosmic evolution of the SFR being mainly driven by that of the molecular gas fraction. The galaxy-averaged molecular Kennicutt–Schmidt (KS) relation between molecular gas and SFR surface densities is strikingly linear, pointing towards similar star formation timescales within galaxies at any given epoch. In terms of morphology, the molecular gas content, the SFR, the disc stellar mass, and the disc molecular gas fraction do not seem to correlate with B/T and the stellar surface density, which suggests an ongoing supply of fresh molecular gas to compensate for the build-up of the bulge. Our measurements do not yield any significant variation of the depletion time with B/T and hence no strong evidence for morphological quenching within the scatter of the MS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use the first systematic samples of CO millimeter emission in z ≥ 1 "main-sequence" star-forming galaxies to study the metallicity dependence of the conversion factor αCO, from CO line luminosity to molecular gas mass. The molecular gas depletion rate inferred from the ratio of the star formation rate (SFR) to CO luminosity, is ~1 Gyr-1 for near-solar metallicity galaxies with stellar masses above Ms ~ 101l M⊙. In this regime, the depletion rate does not vary more than a factor of two to three as a function of molecular gas surface density or redshift between z ~ 0 and 2. Below Ms the depletion rate increases rapidly with decreasing metallicity. We argue that this trend is not caused by starburst events, by changes in the physical parameters of the molecular clouds, or by the impact of the fundamental-metallicity-SFR-stellar mass relation. A more probable explanation is that the conversion factor is metallicity dependent and that star formation can occur in "CO-dark" gas. The trend is also expected theoretically from the effect of enhanced photodissociation of CO by ultraviolet radiation at low metallicity. From the available z ~ 0 and z ~ 1-3 samples we constrain the slope of the log(αCO)-log (metallicity) relation to range between -1 and -2, fairly insensitive to the assumed slope of the gas-SFR relation. Because of the lower metallicities near the peak of the galaxy formation activity at z ~ 1-2 compared to z ~ 0, we suggest that molecular gas masses estimated from CO luminosities have to be substantially corrected upward for galaxies below Ms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use the first systematic data sets of CO molecular line emission in z∼ 1–3 normal star-forming galaxies (SFGs) for a comparison of the dependence of galaxy-averaged star formation rates on molecular gas masses at low and high redshifts, and in different galactic environments. Although the current high- z samples are still small and biased towards the luminous and massive tail of the actively star-forming ‘main-sequence’, a fairly clear picture is emerging. Independent of whether galaxy-integrated quantities or surface densities are considered, low- and high- z SFG populations appear to follow similar molecular gas–star formation relations with slopes 1.1 to 1.2, over three orders of magnitude in gas mass or surface density. The gas-depletion time-scale in these SFGs grows from 0.5 Gyr at to 1.5 Gyr at . The average corresponds to a fairly low star formation efficiency of 2 per cent per dynamical time. Because star formation depletion times are significantly smaller than the Hubble time at all redshifts sampled, star formation rates and gas fractions are set by the balance between gas accretion from the halo and stellar feedback. In contrast, very luminous and ultraluminous, gas-rich major mergers at both low and high z produce on average four to 10 times more far-infrared luminosity per unit gas mass. We show that only some fraction of this difference can be explained by uncertainties in gas mass or luminosity estimators; much of it must be intrinsic. A possible explanation is a top-heavy stellar mass function in the merging systems but the most likely interpretation is that the star formation relation is driven by global dynamical effects. For a given mass, the more compact merger systems produce stars more rapidly because their gas clouds are more compressed with shorter dynamical times, so that they churn more quickly through the available gas reservoir than the typical normal disc galaxies. When the dependence on galactic dynamical time-scale is explicitly included, disc galaxies and mergers appear to follow similar gas-to-star formation relations. The mergers may be forming stars at slightly higher efficiencies than the discs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]