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The Evolution of Galaxies:
From the Local Group to the Epoch of Reionization Fabian Walter NRAO abstract Studies of dwarf galaxies and the highest redshift galaxies are imperative to understand galaxy evolution. Dwarf galaxies are believed to be the closest counterparts to the building blocks of massive galaxies in CDM models. Studies of dwarf galaxies have revealed surprising star formation properties and are important to investigate outflow phenomena, potentially leading to the destruction of low-mass dwarfs and the enrichment of the IGM. Dwarf galaxy dynamics constrain the dark matter properties through comparison to CDM predictions. I will link the studies of star formation processes in local dwarf and more massive galaxies to observations at high redshift. Finally, I will discuss the optical and radio properties of the highest redshift quasars discovered by the SDSS which demonstrate that we are probing the end of cosmic reionization. Recent results show that these systems are already enriched with heavy metals and that they are quite massive. I will discuss the current open questions in systems both nearby and at the highest redshifts, which can only be tackled with the next generation of telescopes such as ALMA, JWST, Herschel, and SKA. |