We investigate the luminosity dependent clustering of rest-frame UV selected galaxies at z \sim 4 , 3 , 2.2 , and 1.7 in the Keck Deep Fields ( KDFs ) , which are complete to \mathcal { R } = 27 and cover 169 arcmin ^ { 2 } .
We find that at z \sim 4 and 3 , UV-bright galaxies cluster more strongly than UV-faint ones , but at z \sim 2.2 and 1.7 , the UV-bright galaxies are no longer the most strongly clustered .
We derive mass estimates for objects in our sample by comparing our measurements to the predicted clustering of dark matter haloes in the Millennium Simulation .
From these estimates , we infer relationships between halo mass and star formation rate ( SFR ) , and find that the most massive dark matter haloes in our sample host galaxies with high SFRs ( M _ { 1700 } < -20 , or > 50 ~ { } { M } _ { \odot } yr ^ { -1 } ) at z \sim 3 and 4 , moderate SFRs ( -20 < M _ { 1700 } < -19 , or \sim 20 ~ { } { M } _ { \odot } yr ^ { -1 } ) at z \sim 2.2 , and lower SFRs ( -19 < M _ { 1700 } < -18 , or \sim 2 ~ { } { M } _ { \odot } yr ^ { -1 } ) at z \sim 1.7 .
We believe our measurements may provide a new line of evidence for galaxy downsizing by extending that concept from stellar to halo mass .
We also find that the objects with blue UV colors in our sample are much more strongly clustered than those with red UV colors , and we propose that this may be due to the presence of the 2175 Ã Â dust absorption bump in more massive halos , which contain the older stellar populations and dust needed to produce the feature .
The relatively small area covered by the survey means that the absolute values of the correlation lengths and halo masses we derive are heavily dependent on the “ integral constraint ” correction , but the uniformly deep coverage across a large redshift interval allows us to detect several important trends that are independent of this correction .