Formation of the First Stars and Quasars

Abstract

We review observable signatures of the first generation of stars and low-luminosity quasars, including the metal enrichment, radiation background, and dust opacity/emission that they produce. We compute the formation history of collapsed baryonic halos based on an extension of the Press-Schechter formalism, incorporating the effects of pressure and H2-dissociation, and calibrate this history to observational data at redshifts z<5. To be consistent with the lack of faint point-sources in the Hubble Deep Field, we introduce a lower limit of 75 km/s for the circular velocities of halos harboring central black holes. Based on our models, we predict that future satellite instruments such as MAP, Planck, and NGST will be able to detect the signatures small star clusters and low-luminosity quasars at redshifts exceeding z=10.