Keywords :
galaxies high-redshift - intergalactic medium - quasars: absorption lines
Abstract:We statistically study the physical properties of a sample of narrow absorption line (NAL) systems looking for empirical evidences to distinguish between intrinsic and intervening NALs without taking into account any a priori definition or velocity cut-off. We analyse the spectra of 100 quasars with 3.5<z_em_<4.5, observed with X-shooter/Very Large Telescope in the context of the XQ-100 Legacy Survey. We detect an ~8{sigma} excess in the CIV number density within 10000km/s of the quasar emission redshift with respect to the random occurrence of NALs. This excess does not show a dependence on the quasar bolometric luminosity and it is not due to the redshift evolution of NALs. It extends far beyond the standard
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