%0 Journal Article
%@ 0035-8711
%A Van Breukelen, C.
%A Jarvis, M.J.
%A Venemans, B.P.
%D 2005
%F discovery:10126
%J Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
%N 3
%P 895-905
%T The luminosity function of Lyα emitters at 2.3 < z < 4.6 from integral-field spectroscopy
%U https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10126/
%V 359
%X We have used Visible MultiObject Spectrograph Integral-Field Unit observations centred on a radio galaxy at  z= 2.9  to search for Lyα emitters within a comoving volume of  ∼104 Mpc3 . We find 14 Lyα emitters with flux  >1.4 × 10−20 W m−2 , yielding a comoving space density of  0.0018+0.0006−0.0005 Mpc−3 . We fit a Schechter luminosity function that agrees well with previous studies both at similar redshift  (z∼ 3.4)  and higher redshift  (z∼ 5.7) . We therefore find no evidence for evolution in the properties of Lyα emitters between  3 < z < 6 , although our sample is small. By summing the star-formation rates of the individual Lyα emitters we find a total cosmic star-formation rate density of  ρSFR= 6.7 ± 0.5 × 10−3 M⊙ yr−1 Mpc−3 . Integrating over the luminosity function for the combined Lyα surveys at  z∼ 3.4  and accounting for the difference in obscuration between the Lyα line and the ultraviolet-continuum yields an estimate of  ρSFR∼ 2.2 × 10−2 M⊙ yr−1 Mpc−3 , in line with previous multi-colour and narrow-band surveys of high-redshift star-forming galaxies. The detection of high-redshift emission-line galaxies in our volumetric search shows that the unique capabilities of wide-field integral-field spectroscopy are well suited to searching for high-redshift galaxies in a relatively unbiased manner.