The morphologies of massive galaxies at 1 z 3 in the CANDELS-UDS field: compact bulges, and the rise and fall of massive disks

We have used high-resolution, HST WFC3/IR, near-infrared imaging to conduct a detailed bulge-disk decomposition of the morphologies of ≃ 200 of the most massive (M * > 1011 M⊙) galaxies at 1 < z < 3 in the CANDELS-UDS field. We find that, while such massive galaxies at low redshift are generally bulge-dominated, at redshifts 1 2 they are mostly disk-dominated. Interestingly, we find that while most of the quiescent galaxies are bulge dominated, a significant fraction (25–40%) of the most quiescent galaxies, have disk-dominated morphologies. Thus, our results suggest that the physical mechanisms which quench star-formation activity are not simply connected to those responsible for the morphological transformation of massive galaxies.