We present the KMOS 3D survey, a new integral field survey of over 600 galaxies at 0.7 < z < 2.7 using KMOS at the Very Large Telescope. The KMOS 3D survey utilizes synergies with multi-wavelength ground-and spacebased surveys to trace the evolution of spatially resolved kinematics and star formation from a homogeneous sample over 5 Gyr of cosmic history. Targets, drawn from a mass-selected parent sample from the 3D-HST survey, cover the star formation-stellar mass (M * ) and rest-frame (U − V ) − M * planes uniformly. We describe the selection of targets, the observations, and the data reduction. In the first-year of data we detect Hα emission in 191 M * = 3 × 10 9 -7 × 10 11 M galaxies at z = 0.7-1.1 and z = 1.9-2.7. In the current sample 83% of the resolved galaxies are rotation dominated, determined from a continuous velocity gradient and v rot /σ 0 > 1, implying that the star-forming "main sequence" is primarily composed of rotating galaxies at both redshift regimes. When considering additional stricter criteria, the Hα kinematic maps indicate that at least ∼70% of the resolved galaxies are disk-like systems. Our high-quality KMOS data confirm the elevated velocity dispersions reported in previous integral field spectroscopy studies at z 0.7. For rotation-dominated disks, the average intrinsic velocity dispersion decreases by a factor of two from 50 km s −1 at z ∼ 2.3 to 25 km s −1 at z ∼ 0.9. Combined with existing results spanning z ∼ 0-3, we show that disk velocity dispersions follow an evolution that is consistent with the dependence of velocity dispersion on gas fractions predicted by marginally stable disk theory.

In the cold dark matter cosmology, the baryonic components of galaxies-stars and gas-are thought to be mixed with and embedded in non-baryonic and non-relativistic dark matter, which dominates the total mass of the galaxy and its dark-matter halo. In the local (low-redshift) Universe, the mass of dark matter within a galactic disk increases with disk radius, becoming appreciable and then dominant in the outer, baryonic regions of the disks of star-forming galaxies. This results in rotation velocities of the visible matter within the disk that are constant or increasing with disk radius-a hallmark of the dark-matter model. Comparisons between the dynamical mass, inferred from these velocities in rotational equilibrium, and the sum of the stellar and cold-gas mass at the peak epoch of galaxy formation ten billion years ago, inferred from ancillary data, suggest high baryon fractions in the inner, star-forming regions of the disks. Although this implied baryon fraction may be larger than in the local Universe, the systematic uncertainties (owing to the chosen stellar initial-mass function and the calibration of gas masses) render such comparisons inconclusive in terms of the mass of dark matter. Here we report rotation curves (showing rotation velocity as a function of disk radius) for the outer disks of six massive star-forming galaxies, and find that the rotation velocities are not constant, but decrease with radius. We propose that this trend arises because of a combination of two main factors: first, a large fraction of the massive high-redshift galaxy population was strongly baryon-dominated, with dark matter playing a smaller part than in the local Universe; and second, the large velocity dispersion in high-redshift disks introduces a substantial pressure term that leads to a decrease in rotation velocity with increasing radius. The effect of both factors appears to increase with redshift. Qualitatively, the observations suggest that baryons in the early (high-redshift) Universe efficiently condensed at the centres of dark-matter haloes when gas fractions were high and dark matter was less concentrated.

In this paper we follow up on our previous detection of nuclear ionized outflows in the most massive (log(M * /M  )  10.9) z ~ 1-3 star-forming galaxies (Förster Schreiber et al.), by increasing the sample size by a factor of six (to 44 galaxies above log(M * /M  )  10.9) from a combination of the SINS/zC-SINF, LUCI, GNIRS, and KMOS 3D spectroscopic surveys. We find a fairly sharp onset of the incidence of broad nuclear emission (FWHM in the Hα, [NII], and [SII] lines ~450 -5300 km/s), with large[NII]/Hα ratios, above log(M * /M  )~10.9, with about two thirds of the galaxies in this mass range exhibiting this component. Broad nuclear components near and above the Schechter mass are similarly prevalent above and below the main sequence of starforming galaxies, and at z~1 and ~2. The line ratios of the nuclear component are fit by excitation from active galactic nuclei (AGN), or by a combination of shocks and photoionization. The incidence of the most massive galaxies with broad nuclear components is at least as large as that of AGNs identified by X-ray, optical, infrared or radio indicators. The mass loading of the nuclear outflows is near unity. Our findings provide compelling evidence for powerful, high-duty cycle, AGN-driven outflows near the Schechter mass, and acting across the peak of cosmic galaxy formation.