Selection of massive evolved galaxies at $3 \leq z \leq 4.5$ in the
  CANDELS fields
  Using the CANDELS photometric catalogs for the HST/ACS and WFC3, we
identified massive evolved galaxies at $3 < z < 4.5$, employing three different
selection methods. We find the comoving number density of these objects to be
$\sim 2 \times 10^{-5}$ and $8 \times 10^{-6}Mpc^{-3}$ after correction for
completeness for two redshift bins centered at $z=3.4, 4.7$. We quantify a
measure of how much confidence we should have for each candidate galaxy from
different selections and what are the conservative error estimates propagated
into our selection. Then we compare the evolution of the corresponding number
densities and their stellar mass density with numerical simulations,
semi-analytical models, and previous observational estimates, which shows
slight tension at higher redshifts as the models tend to underestimate the
number and mass densities. By estimating the average halo masses of the
candidates ($M_h \approx 4.2, 1.9, 1.3 \times 10^{12} M_\odot$ for redshift
bins centered at $z=3.4, 4.1, 4.7$), we find them to be consistent with halos
that were efficient in turning baryons to stars and were relatively immune to
the feedback effects and on the verge of transition into hot-mode accretion.
This can suggest the relative cosmological starvation of the cold gas followed
by an overconsumption phase in which the galaxy consumes the available cold gas
rapidly as one of the possible drivers for the quenching of the massive evolved
population at high redshift.
