LAUSR

We present the photometric determination of the bright-end of the Lyα luminosity function (at LLyα & 10 43.5 erg s−1) within four redshifts windows (∆ z< 0.16) in the interval 2.2. z.3.3. Our work is based on the Javalambre Photometric Local Universe Survey (J-PLUS) first data-release, which provides multiple narrow-band measurements over ∼1000 deg2, with limiting magnitude r∼22. The analysis of high-z Lyα-emitting sources over such a wide area is unprecedented, and allows to select a total of ∼14, 500 hyper-bright (LLyα > 1043.3 erg s−1) Lyα-emitting candidates. We test our selection with two spectroscopic follow-up programs at the GTC telescope, which confirm as line-emitting sources ∼ 89% of the targets, with ∼ 64% being genuine z ∼ 2.2 QSOs. We extend the 2.2 . z . 3.3 Lyα luminosity function for the first time above LLyα ∼ 1044 erg s−1 and down to densities of ∼10−8 Mpc−3. Our results unveil with high detail the Schechter exponential-decay of the brightest-end of the Lyα LF, complementing the power-law component of previous LF determinations at 43.3.Log10(LLyα/erg s−1).44. We measure Φ∗ = (3.33±0.19)×10−6, Log(L∗) = 44.65±0.65 and α = −1.35±0.84 as an average over the redshifts we probe. These values are significantly different than the typical Schechter parameters measured for the Lyα LF of high-z star-forming LAEs. This suggests that z > 2 AGN/QSOs (likely dominant in our samples) are described by a structurally different LF than z>2 star-forming LAEs, namely with LQSOs ∼ 100 LLAEs and ΦQSOs ∼ 10−3 ΦLAEs. Finally, our method identifies very efficiently as high-z line-emitters sources without previous spectroscopic confirmation, currently classified as stars (∼ 2000 objects in each redshift bin, on average). Assuming a large predominance of Lyα-emitting AGN/QSOs in our samples, this supports the scenario by which these are the most abundant class of z&2 Lyα emitters at LLyα & 10 43.3 erg s−1.