ρ_gas as a function of redshift. The green, orange and red dotted lines represent ρ_gas derived from this work with $M_{\star }^{\lim }$ of 1.7 × 10⁸, 1.7 × 10⁹ and 1.7 × 10¹⁰ M_⊙, respectively, using M_gas deduced with the Scoville et al. (2016) method only. The corresponding result deduced throughout this paper are displayed in faded solid red, orange and green coloured lines. The green, orange and red hatches represent estimates of ρ_gas from Magnelli et al. (2020) with $M_{\star }^{\lim }$ of 1.7 × 10⁸, 1.7 × 10⁹ and 1.7 × 10¹⁰ M_⊙, respectively. The green dots with black circles depict the estimate of ρ_gas from Magnelli et al. (2020) for M_⋆ >  M_limit, M_limit being the stellar mass completeness limit from Magnelli et al. (2020).