No Arabic abstract
Using all-sky maps obtained from COBE/DIRBE at 3.5 and 4.9 um, we present a reanalysis of diffuse sky emissions such as zodiacal light (ZL), diffuse Galactic light (DGL), integrated starlight (ISL), and isotropic residual emission including the extragalactic background light (EBL). Our new analysis, which includes an improved estimate of ISL using the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) data, enabled us to find the DGL signal in a direct linear correlation between diffuse near-infrared and 100 um emission at high Galactic latitudes (|b| > 35 degree). At 3.5um, the high-latitude DGL result is comparable to the low-latitude value derived from the previous DIRBE analysis. In comparison with models of the DGL spectrum assuming a size distribution of dust grains composed of amorphous silicate, graphite, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH), the measured DGL values at 3.5 and 4.9 um constrain the mass fraction of PAH particles in the total dust species to be more than ~ 2%. This was consistent with the results of Spitzer/IRAC toward the lower Galactic latitude regions. The derived residual emission of 8.9 +/- 3.4 nW m^{-2} sr^{-1} at 3.5 um is marginally consistent with the level of integrated galaxy light and the EBL constraints from the gamma-ray observations. The residual emission at 4.9 um is not significantly detected due to the large uncertainty in the ZL subtraction, same as previous studies. Combined with our reanalysis of the DIRBE data at 1.25 and 2.2 um, the residual emission in the near-infrared exhibits the Rayleigh-Jeans spectrum.
Using all-sky maps obtained with COBE/DIRBE, we reanalyzed the diffuse sky brightness at 1.25 and 2.2 um, which consists of zodiacal light, diffuse Galactic light (DGL), integrated starlight (ISL), and isotropic emission including the extragalactic background light. Our new analysis including an improved estimate of the DGL and the ISL with the 2MASS data showed that deviations of the isotropic emission from isotropy were less than 10% in the entire sky at high Galactic latitude (|b|>35). The result of our analysis revealed a significantly large isotropic component at 1.25 and 2.2 um with intensities of 60.15 +/- 16.14 and 27.68 +/- 6.21 nWm-2sr-1, respectively. This intensity is larger than the integrated galaxy light, upper limits from gamma-ray observation, and potential contribution from exotic sources (i.e., Population III stars, intrahalo light, direct collapse black holes, and dark stars). We therefore conclude that the excess light may originate from the local universe; the Milky Way and/or the solar system.
Observational study on near-infrared (IR) scattering properties of interstellar dust grains has been limited due to its faintness. Using all-sky maps obtained from Diffuse Infrared Background Experiment (DIRBE), we investigate the scattering property from diffuse Galactic light (DGL) measurements at 1.25, 2.2, and 3.5 {mu}m in addition to our recent analyses of diffuse near-IR emission (Sano et al. 2015; Sano et al. 2016). As a result, we first find that the intensity ratios of near-IR DGL to 100 {mu}m emission increase toward low Galactic latitudes at 1.25 and 2.2 {mu}m. The derived latitude dependence can be reproduced by a scattered light model of interstellar dust with a large scattering asymmetry factor g = <cos{theta}> of $0.8^{+0.2}_{-0.3}$ at 1.25 and 2.2 {mu}m, assuming an infinite Galaxy disk as an illuminating source. The derived asymmetry factor is comparable to the values obtained in the optical, but several times larger than that expected from a recent dust model. Since possible latitude dependence of ultraviolet-excited dust emission at 1.25 and 2.2 {mu}m would reduce the large asymmetry factor to the reasonable value, our result may indicate the first detection of such an additional emission component in the diffuse interstellar medium.
Detection of point sources in images is a fundamental operation in astrophysics, and is crucial for constraining population models of the underlying point sources or characterizing the background emission. Standard techniques fall short in the crowded-field limit, losing sensitivity to faint sources and failing to track their covariance with close neighbors. We construct a Bayesian framework to perform inference of faint or overlapping point sources. The method involves probabilistic cataloging, where samples are taken from the posterior probability distribution of catalogs consistent with an observed photon count map. In order to validate our method we sample random catalogs of the gamma-ray sky in the direction of the North Galactic Pole (NGP) by binning the data in energy and Point Spread Function (PSF) classes. Using three energy bins spanning $0.3 - 1$, $1 - 3$ and $3 - 10$ GeV, we identify $270substack{+30 -10}$ point sources inside a $40^circ times 40^circ$ region around the NGP above our point-source inclusion limit of $3 times 10^{-11}$/cm$^2$/s/sr/GeV at the $1-3$ GeV energy bin. Modeling the flux distribution as a power law, we infer the slope to be $-1.92substack{+0.07 -0.05}$ and estimate the contribution of point sources to the total emission as $18substack{+2 -2}$%. These uncertainties in the flux distribution are fully marginalized over the number as well as the spatial and spectral properties of the unresolved point sources. This marginalization allows a robust test of whether the apparently isotropic emission in an image is due to unresolved point sources or of truly diffuse origin.
Short millimeter observations of radio-loud AGN offer the opportunity to study the physics of their inner relativistic jets, from where the bulk millimeter emission is radiated. Millimeter jets are significantly less affected by Faraday rotation and depolarization than in radio. Also, the millimeter emission is dominated by the innermost jet regions, that are invisible in radio owing to synchrotron opacity. We present the first dual frequency simultaneous 86GHz and 229GHz polarimetric survey of all four Stokes parameters of a large sample of 211 radio loud active galactic nuclei, designed to be flux limited at 1Jy at 86GHz. The observations were most of them made in mid August 2010 using the XPOL polarimeter on the IRAM 30 m millimeter radio telescope. Linear polarization detections above 3 sigma median level of ~1.0% are reported for 183 sources at 86GHz, and for 23 sources at 229GHz, where the median 3 sigma level is ~6.0%. We show a clear excess of the linear polarization degree detected at 229GHz with regard to that at 86GHz by a factor of ~1.6, thus implying a progressively better ordered magnetic field for blazar jet regions located progressively upstream in the jet. We show that the linear polarization angle, both at 86 and 229GHz, and the jet structural position angle for both quasars and BL Lacs do not show a clear preference to align in either parallel or perpendicular directions. Our variability study with regard to the 86GHz data from our previous survey points out a large degree variation of total flux and linear polarization in time scales of years by median factors of ~1.5 in total flux, and ~1.7 in linear polarization degree -maximum variations by factors up to 6.3, and ~5, respectively-, with 86% of sources showing linear polarization angles evenly distributed with regard to our previous measurements.
We estimate the dust polarized emission in our galaxy at high galactic latitudes, which is the dominant foreground for measuring CMB polarization using the high frequency instrument (HFI) aboard Planck surveyor. We compare it with the level of CMB polarization and conclude that, for angular scales $le 1^{circ}$, the scalar-induced CMB polarization and temperature-polarization cross-correlation are much larger than the foreground level at $ u simeq 100 GHz$. The tensor-induced signals seem to be at best comparable to the foreground level.}