The cold circumgalactic medium in emission: Mg ii haloes in TNG50

We outline theoretical predictions for extended emission from MgII, tracing cool ~10^4 K gas in the circumgalactic medium (CGM) of star-forming galaxies in the high-resolution TNG50 cosmological magnetohydrodynamical simulation. We synthesize surface brightness maps of this strong rest-frame ultraviolet metal emission doublet (2796, 2803), adopting the assumption that the resonant scattering of MgII can be neglected and connecting to recent and upcoming observations with the Keck/KCWI, VLT/MUSE, and BlueMUSE optical integral field unit spectrographs. Studying galaxies with stellar masses 7.5 20 kpc at the highest masses, and sizes are larger for halos in denser environments. MgII halos are highly structured, clumpy, and asymmetric, with isophotal axis ratio increasing with galaxy mass. Similarly, the amount and distribution of MgII emission depends on the star formation activity of the central galaxy. Kinematically, inflowing versus outflowing gas dominates the MgII luminosity at high and low galaxy masses, respectively, although the majority of MgII halo emission at z~0.7 traces near-equilibrium fountain flows and gas with non-negligible rotational support, rather than rapidly outflowing galactic winds.