C R I S T A L

A survey of gas, dust, and stars in star-forming galaxies when the Universe was ~1 billion years old

CRISTAL is an ALMA Cycle 8 Large Program that observed in the [CII] 158 μm line and dust continuum 19 main-sequence, star-forming galaxies at z~4−5. With the combination of ALMA, HST, and JWST, CRISTAL produced a systematic census of the gas, dust, and stars on kiloparsec scales when the Universe was only ∼1 billion years old.

CRISTAL is designed to have a lasting impact on four scientific areas

Kinematics

We constrained the nature of the galaxies (disk vs. merger), quantified the amount of rotation vs. random motions, and measured the rotation curves and velocity dispersion profiles.

Check:
- Telikova et al. 2024
- Poses et al. 2025
- Lee et al. submitted

Outflows

We searched for cold gas outflows on individual galaxies, constraining their occurrence and main properties such as mass and mass loss rates.

Check:
- Birkin et al. 2025
- Davies et al. submitted

Morphology & Halo

We characterized the distribution of the gas, dust and stars on kiloparsec scales. We studied the extended or "halo" emission, exploring its origin and powering mechanism.

Check:
- Solimano et al. 2024
- Ikeda et al. 2024

Interstellar Medium

We constrained the ISM properties by combining [C II] and dust continuum emission with stellar and UV light measurements from HST and JWST observations.

Check:
- Villanueva et al. 2024
- Li et al. 2024
- Lines et al. 2025
- Mitsuhashi et al. 2024

Survey paper
Herrera-Camus, González-López, Förster Schreiber, Aravena, de Looze, Spilker, Tadaki et al. 2025

Fig. 9 from Survey paper - [CII] integrated line emission maps for the CRISTAL galaxies.

Fig. 10 from Survey paper - JWST composite images of CRISTAL galaxies, overlaid with [CII] line emission (white contours) and dust continuum emission (pink contours).

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