On the origin of near-infrared extragalactic background light anisotropy

Michael Zemcov; Joseph Smidt; Toshiaki Arai; James Bock; Asantha Cooray; Yan Gong; Min Gyu Kim; Phillip Korngut; Anson Lam; Dae Hee Lee; Toshio Matsumoto; Shuji Matsuura; Uk Won Nam; Gael Roudier; Kohji Tsumura; Takehiko Wada

doi:10.1126/science.1258168

On the origin of near-infrared extragalactic background light anisotropy

Science. 2014 Nov 7;346(6210):732-5. doi: 10.1126/science.1258168.

Authors

Michael Zemcov¹, Joseph Smidt², Toshiaki Arai³, James Bock⁴, Asantha Cooray⁵, Yan Gong⁵, Min Gyu Kim⁶, Phillip Korngut⁷, Anson Lam⁸, Dae Hee Lee⁹, Toshio Matsumoto¹⁰, Shuji Matsuura¹¹, Uk Won Nam⁹, Gael Roudier¹², Kohji Tsumura¹³, Takehiko Wada¹¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA. Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Pasadena, CA 91109, USA.
² Theoretical Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, USA. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Irvine, CA 92697, USA.
³ Department of Space Astronomy and Astrophysics, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Sagamihara, Kanagawa 252-5210, Japan. Department of Physics, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan.
⁴ Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA. Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Pasadena, CA 91109, USA. [email protected].
⁵ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Irvine, CA 92697, USA.
⁶ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-742, Korea.
⁷ Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Pasadena, CA 91109, USA. Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
⁸ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA. Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
⁹ Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI), Daejeon 305-348, Korea.
¹⁰ Department of Space Astronomy and Astrophysics, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Sagamihara, Kanagawa 252-5210, Japan. Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Academia Sinica, Taipei 10617, Taiwan, Republic of China.
¹¹ Department of Space Astronomy and Astrophysics, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Sagamihara, Kanagawa 252-5210, Japan.
¹² Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Pasadena, CA 91109, USA.
¹³ Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Science, Tohoku University, Sendai, Miyagi, 980-8578, Japan.

PMID: 25378620
DOI: 10.1126/science.1258168

Abstract

Extragalactic background light (EBL) anisotropy traces variations in the total production of photons over cosmic history and may contain faint, extended components missed in galaxy point-source surveys. Infrared EBL fluctuations have been attributed to primordial galaxies and black holes at the epoch of reionization (EOR) or, alternately, intrahalo light (IHL) from stars tidally stripped from their parent galaxies at low redshift. We report new EBL anisotropy measurements from a specialized sounding rocket experiment at 1.1 and 1.6 micrometers. The observed fluctuations exceed the amplitude from known galaxy populations, are inconsistent with EOR galaxies and black holes, and are largely explained by IHL emission. The measured fluctuations are associated with an EBL intensity that is comparable to the background from known galaxies measured through number counts and therefore a substantial contribution to the energy contained in photons in the cosmos.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.