Speaker: Reinhard Genzel
Max-Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics Garching, Germany & Department of Physics, University of California, Berkeley
 

Reinhard Genzel will discuss the results of three major programs of studying star formation, cold gas, feedback and dynamics of massive 'normal' star forminggalaxies near the peak of the epoch of galaxy formation (z~1-3). Our observations, carried out with the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer andwith two large instruments developed at MPE (the VLT near-IR integral field spectrometer SINFONI and the far-IR spectrometer/photometer PACS onHerschel) show that massive galaxies near the star formation-stellar mass 'main-sequence' were gas rich, highly turbulent and clumpy, disky systemswith various degrees of rotational support. Star formation in these galaxies was plausibly driven by continuous, rapid accretion of gas and minormergers from the cosmic web. The evolution of their disks and central bulges was probably strongly influenced by disk fragmentation andinstabilities, as well as by powerful galactic outflows driven from the large star forming clumps. I will discuss the impact of these newobservations on our understanding of galaxy evolution in the early Universe.