No Arabic abstract
Based on the photometric data from the Spitzer/SAGE survey and with red giants as the extinction tracers, the mid-infrared (MIR) extinction laws in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) are derived for the first time in the form of A_lambda/A_Ks, the extinction in the four IRAC bands (i.e., [3.6], [4.5], [5.8] and [8.0]um) relative to the 2MASS Ks band at 2.16um. We obtain the near-infrared (NIR) extinction coefficient to be E(J-H)/E(H-Ks)=1.29pm0.04 and E(J-Ks)/E(H-Ks)=1.94pm0.04. The wavelength dependence of the MIR extinction A_lambda/A_Ks in the LMC varies from one sightline to another. The overall mean MIR extinction is A_[3.6]/A_Ks=0.72pm0.03, A_[4.5]/A_Ks=0.94pm0.03, A_[5.8]/A_Ks=0.58pm0.04, and A_[8.0]/A_Ks=0.62pm0.05. Except for the extinction in the IRAC [4.5] band which may be contaminated by the 4.6um CO gas absorption of red giants (which are used to trace the LMC extinction), the extinction in the other three IRAC bands show a flat curve, close to the Milky Way Rv = 5.5 model extinction curve (where Rv is the optical total-to-selective extinction ratio). The possible systematic bias caused by the correlated uncertainties of Ks-lambda and J-Ks is explored in terms of Monte-Carlo simulations. It is found that this could lead to an overestimation of A_lambda/A_Ks in the MIR.
We determine the slope of the near infrared extinction power law (A$_{lambda} propto lambda^{-alpha}$) for 8 regions of the Galaxy between l$sim27^{circ}$ and $sim100^{circ}$. UKIDSS Galactic Plane Survey data are compared, in colour-colour space, with Galactic population synthesis model data reddened using a series of power laws and convolved through the UKIDSS filter profiles. Monte Carlo simulations allow us to determine the best fit value of $alpha$ and evaluate the uncertainty. All values are consistent with each other giving an average extinction power law of $alpha$=2.14$^{+0.04}_{-0.05}$. This is much steeper than most laws previously derived in the literature from colour excess ratios, which are typically between 1.6 and 1.8. We show that this discrepancy is due to an inappropriate choice of filter wavelength in conversion from colour excess ratios to $alpha$ and that effective rather than isophotal wavelengths are more appropriate. In addition, curved reddening tracks, which depend on spectral type and filter system, should be used instead of straight vectors.
A precise measure of the mid-infrared interstellar extinction law is crucial to the investigation of the properties of interstellar dust, especially of the grains in the large size end. Based on the stellar parameters derived from the SDSS-III/APOGEE spectroscopic survey, we select a large sample of G- and K-type giants as the tracers of the Galactic mid-infrared extinction. We calculate the intrinsic stellar color excesses from the stellar effective temperatures and use them to determine the mid-infrared extinction for a given line of sight. For the entire sky of the Milky Way surveyed by APOGEE, we derive the extinction (relative to the K$_{rm S}$ band at wavelength $lambda=2.16mu$m) for the four WISE bands at 3.4, 4.6, 12 and 22$mu$m, the four Spitzer/IRAC bands at 3.6, 4.5, 5.8 and 8$mu$m, the Spitzer/MIPS24 band at 23.7$mu$m and for the first time, the AKARI/S9W band at 8.23$mu$m. Our results agree with previous works in that the extinction curve is flat in the ~3--8$mu$m wavelength range and is generally consistent with the $R_V=5.5$ model curve except our determination exceeds the model prediction in the WISE/W4 band. Although some previous works found that the mid-IR extinction law appears to vary with the extinction depth $A_{rm{K_S}}$, no noticeable variation has been found in this work. The uncertainties are analyzed in terms of the bootstrap resampling method and Monte-Carlo simulation and are found to be rather small.
A precise extinction law is a critical input when interpreting observations of highly reddened sources such as young star clusters and the Galactic Center (GC). We use Hubble Space Telescope observations of a region of moderate extinction and a region of high extinction to measure the optical and near-infrared extinction law (0.8 $mu$m -- 2.2 $mu$m). The moderate extinction region is the young massive cluster Westerlund 1 (Wd1; A$_{Ks} sim$ 0.6 mag), where 453 proper motion-selected main-sequence stars are used to measure the shape of the extinction law. To quantify the shape we define the parameter $mathcal{S}_{1/lambda}$, which behaves similarly to a color excess ratio but is continuous as a function of wavelength. The high extinction region is the GC (A$_{Ks} sim$ 2.5 mag), where 819 red clump stars are used to determine the normalization of the law. The best-fit extinction law is able to reproduce the Wd1 main sequence colors, which previous laws misestimate by 10%-30%. The law is inconsistent with a single power law, even when only the near-infrared filters are considered, and has A$_{F125W}$/A$_{Ks}$ and A$_{F814W}$/A$_{Ks}$ values that are 18% and 24% larger than the commonly used citet{Nishiyama:2009fc} law, respectively. Using the law we recalculate the Wd1 distance to be 3896 $pm$ 328 pc from published observations of eclipsing binary W13. This new extinction law should be used for highly reddened populations in the Milky Way, such as the Quintuplet cluster and Young Nuclear Cluster. A python code is provided to generate the law for future use.
We combine near-infrared (2MASS) and mid-infrared (Spitzer-IRAC) photometry to characterize the IR extinction law (1.2-8 microns) over nearly 150 degrees of contiguous Milky Way midplane longitude. The relative extinctions in 5 passbands across these wavelength and longitude ranges are derived by calculating color excess ratios for G and K giant red clump stars in contiguous midplane regions and deriving the wavelength dependence of extinction in each one. Strong, monotonic variations in the extinction law shape are found as a function of angle from the Galactic center, symmetric on either side of it. These longitudinal variations persist even when dense interstellar regions, known a priori to have a shallower extinction curve, are removed. The increasingly steep extinction curves towards the outer Galaxy indicate a steady decrease in the absolute-to-selective extinction ratio (R_V) and in the mean dust grain size at greater Galactocentric angles. We note an increasing strength of the 8 micron extinction inflection at high Galactocentric angles and, using theoretical dust models, show that this behavior is consistent with the trend in R_V. Along several lines of sight where the solution is most feasible, A_lambda/A_Ks as a function of Galactic radius is estimated and shown to have a Galactic radial dependence. Our analyses suggest that the observed relationship between extinction curve shape and Galactic longitude is due to an intrinsic dependence of the extinction law on Galactocentric radius.
We examine the three-dimensional structure and dust extinction properties in a ~ 200 pc $times$ 100 pc region in the southwest bar of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). We model a deep Hubble Space Telescope optical color-magnitude diagram (CMD) of red clump and red giant branch stars to infer the dust extinction and galactic structure. We model the distance distribution of the stellar component with a Gaussian and find a centroid distance of 65.2 kpc (distance modulus $mu$ = 19.07 mag) with a FWHM $approx$ 11.3 kpc. This large extent along the line of sight reproduces results from previous studies using variable stars and red clump stars. Additionally, we find an offset between the stellar and dust distributions, with the dust on the near side relative to the stars by 3.22 $^{+1.69}_{-1.44}$ kpc, resulting in a 73% reddened fraction of stars. Modeling the dust layer with a log-normal $A_V$ distribution indicates a mean extinction $langle A_V rangle$ = 0.41 $pm$ 0.09 mag. We also calculate $A_V/N_H$ = 3.2 - 4.2 $times10^{-23}$ mag cm$^2$ H$^{-1}$ which is significantly lower than the Milky Way value but is comparable to previous SMC dust-to-gas ratio measurements. Our results yield the first joint dust extinction and 3D geometry properties in a key region in the SMC. This study demonstrates that CMD modeling can be a powerful tool to simultaneously constrain dust extinction and geometry properties in nearby galaxies.