Dust Emission in an Accretion-rate-limited Sample of z ≳ 6 Quasars

Abstract

We present Atacama Large Millimeter Array 1 mm observations of the rest-frame far-infrared (FIR) dust continuum in 27 quasars at redshifts 6.0 less than or similar to z < 6.7. We detect FIR emission at greater than or similar to 3 sigma in all quasar host galaxies with flux densities at similar to 1900 GHz in the rest-frame of 0.12 < S-rest,S- (1900) (GHz) < 5.9 mJy, with a median (mean) flux density of 0.88 mJy (1.59 mJy). The implied FIR luminosities range from L-FIR = (0.27-13) x 10(12) L-circle dot, with 74% of our quasar hosts having L-FIR > 10(12) L-circle dot The estimated dust masses are M-dust = 10(7)-10(9) M-circle dot. If the dust is heated only by star formation, then the star formation rates in the quasar host galaxies are between 50 and 2700 M-circle dot yr(-1). In the framework of the host galaxy-black hole coevolution model a correlation between ongoing black hole growth and star formation in the quasar host galaxy would be expected. However, combined with results from the literature to create a luminosity-limited quasar sample, we do not find a strong correlation between quasar UV luminosity (a proxy for ongoing black hole growth) and FIR luminosity (star formation in the host galaxy). The absence of such a correlation in our data does not necessarily rule out the coevolution model, and could be due to a variety of effects (including different timescales for black hole accretion and FIR emission).