H2O emission in high- z ultra-luminous infrared galaxies

Using the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer (PdBI), we report the detection of water vapor in six new lensed ultra-luminous starburst galaxies at high redshift, discovered in the Herschel Astrophysical Terahertz Large Area Survey (H-ATLAS). The sources are detected either in the 202-1 11 or 211-202 H2O emission lines with integrated line fluxes ranging from 1.8 to 14 Jy km s-1. The corresponding apparent luminosities are μLH2O ~ 3-12 × 108 L⊙, where μ is the lensing magnification factor (3 < μ < 12). These results confirm that H 2O lines are among the strongest molecular lines in high-z ultra-luminous starburst galaxies, with intensities almost comparable to those of the high-J CO lines, and similar profiles and line widths (~200-900 km s -1). With the current sensitivity of the PdBI, the water lines can therefore easily be detected in high-z lensed galaxies (with F(500 μm) > 100 mJy) discovered in the Herschel surveys. Correcting the luminosities for amplification, using existing lensing models, LH2O is found to have a strong dependence on the infrared luminosity, varying as ~LIR1.2. This relation, which needs to be confirmed with better statistics, may indicate a role of radiative (infrared) excitation of the H 2O lines, and implies that high-z galaxies with LIR ≥ 1013 L⊙ tend to be very strong emitters in water vapor, that have no equivalent in the local universe. © ESO, 2013.