Properties of high-Z galaxies seen through lensing clusters

Abstract

We present new results obtained on the identification and study of high-z galaxies seen through lensing clusters used as gravitational telescopes. The amplification effect provides a tool to study the spectrophotometric and morphological properties of such galaxies 1 to 3 magnitudes deeper with respect to field surveys. Distant sources with 1 ≤ z ≤ 7 typically are selected close to the critical lines in clusters where the mass distribution is well known, using photometric redshifts computed on a large wavelength interval, as well as lens-inversion criteria. We focus here on the recent results obtained on AC114 and MS1008-1224, two lensing clusters at z = 0.31.