Semi-empirical constraints on the HI mass function of star-forming galaxies and ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}$ at $z\sim 0.37$ from interferometric surveys

Abstract

The HI mass function is a crucial tool to understand the evolution of the HI content in galaxies over cosmic times. We aim to derive semi-empirical constraints at $z\sim 0.37$ by combining literature results on the $M_{\star }$ function from optical surveys with recent findings on the $M_{\mathrm{HI}}-M_{\star }$ scaling relation derived via spectral stacking analysis applied to 21-cm line interferometric data from the MIGHTEE and CHILES surveys, conducted with the MeerKAT and VLA radio telescopes, respectively. We draw synthetic $M_{\star }$ samples directly from the publicly-available results underlying the analysis of the COSMOS2020 galaxy photometric sample. Afterwards, we convert $M_{\star }$ into $M_{\mathrm{HI}}$ using analytical fitting functions to the data points from HI stacking. We then fit a Schechter function to the median HIMF from all the samples via MCMC. We finally derive the posterior distribution for ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}$ by integrating the models for the HIMF built from the posteriors samples of the Schechter parameters. We find a deviation of the HIMF at $z\sim 0.37$ from the results at $z\sim 0$ from the ALFALFA survey and at $z\sim 1$ from uGMRT data. Our results for ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}$ are in broad agreement with other literature results, and follow the overall trend on ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}$ as a function of redshift. The derived value ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}=\left(7.02_{-0.52}^{+0.59}\right)\times 10^{-4}$ at $z\sim 0.37$ from the combined analysis deviates at $\sim 2.9\sigma$ from the ALFALFA result at $z\sim 0$. Our findings about the HIMF and ${\Omega }_{\mathrm{HI}}$ differ from previous literature results at $z\sim 0$ and $z\sim 1$, although we are unable to confirm at this stage whether these differences are due to cosmic evolution consistent with a smooth transition of the HI content of galaxies over the last 8 Gyr or due to selection biases and systematics.

19 pages, 14 figures, 5 tables. Accepted for publication in A&A. Current version matching the accepted manuscript

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