Cake Talk by Matus Rybak

"The first few Gyr after the Big Bang are the most dramatic chapters of the cosmic history. Half of all stars formed in this epoch, mainly in dust-enshrouded, sub-mm bright galaxies. However, these dusty giants are often invisible to optical telescopes and have to be studied at sub-mm wavelengths, with limited spatial resolution, sensitivity, and bandwidth. Thus, despite two decades of effort, key characteristics of high-redshift dusty galaxies - how is their star formation distributed? how does it relate to their diffuse and dense gas content? - remain uncertain.

Thankfully, rapid advances in mm-wave technology are helping dissect galaxies in the early Universe in unprecedented detail and complexity. I will show recent results from high-resolution studies of the obscured star formation and gas content of dusty galaxies, achieved using ALMA, NOEMA, and VLA. These provide first views of the complex morphologies and extreme conditions in these distant galaxies. Finally, I will outline the challenge for the 2030's: scaling these studies up to hundreds of galaxies via a massive, SDSS-like surveys at sub-mm wavelengths using ultra-wideband spectroscopy. "