Herschel-ATLAS/GAMA: Spatial clustering of low-redshift submm galaxies

Abstract

We have measured the clustering properties of low-redshift (z < 0.3) submm galaxies detected at 250 μm in the Herschel-ATLAS science demonstration phase field. We selected a sample for which we have high-quality spectroscopic redshifts, obtained from reliably matching the 250-μm sources to a complete (for r < 19.4) sample of galaxies from the GAMA data base. Both the angular and spatial clustering strength are measured for all z < 0.3 sources as well as for five redshift slices with thickness Δz = 0.05 in the range 0.05 < z < 0.3. Our measured spatial clustering length r0 is comparable to that of optically selected, moderately star-forming (blue) galaxies: we find values around 5Mpc. One of the redshift bins contains an interesting structure, at z = 0.164. © 2012 The Authors Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society © 2012 RAS.