Intensity Mapping of the History of Stellar Emission with the Cosmic Infrared Background ExpeRiment-2
Abstract
Recent measurements of the near-infrared Extragalactic Background Light (EBL) anisotropy find excess spatial power above the level predicted by known galaxy populations at large angular scales. These anisotropies trace spatial variations in integrated photon production, so measurements of EBL surface brightness fluctuations provide a complete census of the emission from stars summed over cosmic history. As a result, EBL fluctuations contain contributions from objects forming during the Epoch of Reionization (EOR), from the integrated galactic light (IGL), and faint, extended components such as intra-halo light (IHL) from stars tidally stripped from galaxies during merger events. Additional measurements with greater sensitivity, spectral range, and spectral resolution are required to disentangle these contributions.The Cosmic Infrared Background ExpeRiment 2 (CIBER-2) is an instrument optimized for the measurement of near-infrared EBL anisotropies. As the Earth's atmosphere generates time-varying near-infrared emission, CIBER-2 is launched on a sounding rocket from which it will carry out multiwavelength imaging in six spectral bands that span the visible to near-infrared. The 2.4 square degree images allow CIBER-2 to produce measurements of EBL fluctuations with high fidelity on large angular scales. The Lyman break feature from EOR sources provides a unique spectral feature which can be used to disentangle the high from the low redshift contributions to the anisotropy signal. Measurement in six independent wavebands allows detailed cross-correlation studies to constrain the source of the excess fluctuations at large angular scales. We provide an overview of the CIBER-2 instrument and explain CIBER-2 spectral feature identification and cross-correlation study methodologies.
- Publication:
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American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #227
- Pub Date:
- January 2016
- Bibcode:
- 2016AAS...22733503L