A SHARP look at quenching and bulge–disk growth in massive galaxies at cosmic noon

The physical mechanisms that quench star formation in massive galaxies remain poorly understood. At cosmic noon ( 1 ≲ z ≲ 3 ), when star formation and AGN activity peak, galaxies rapidly evolve from star-forming disks into quiescent, bulge-dominated systems. While quenching correlates with stellar mass and bulge growth, the causal link between bulge assembly, star-formation suppression, and feedback processes remains unclear. Stellar population analysis from spatially resolved spectroscopy of galaxies caught during quenching is crucial to advance on this issue. We show that the SHARP–VESPER Integral-Field Spectrograph (IFS) can efficiently fill this gap by combining ELT-class sensitivity, 31 mas spatial resolution ( > 3 × sharper than JWST) and broad near-IR wavelength coverage with 12-IFU multiplexing. This will enable, for the first time, a simultaneous bulge–disk decomposition of stellar populations and spatially resolved mapping of ionised gas in massive galaxies (log M ∗ /M ⊙ ≥ 11 ) at 2 . 2 < z < 3 . 5 , targeting systems on the main sequence shortly before quenching or already in the green valley. With typical exposure times of ∼ 15 hr, we will obtain S/N r e s ≥ 15–20, i.e., per spectral resolution element, on the (inner) bulge, and (outer) disk extracted spectral continuum, and S/N r e s ¿5 for nebular lines ([O II], H β , [O III], H α ) on sub-kpc scales. These observations will allow us to reconstruct independent bulge and disk star-formation histories, ages, metallicities, and α -enhancements, while mapping spatially resolved star formation, gas kinematics, and feedback-driven outflows. By directly comparing the timing of bulge growth and star-formation suppression across galaxy components, this programme will test whether quenching proceeds inside-out, distinguish fast and slow quenching pathways, and link structural transformation to feedback processes in the most massive galaxies at cosmic noon.