STScI Preprint #1264

The Cobe Diffuse Infrared Background Experiment Search for the Cosmic Infrared Background: I. Limits and Detections

The Diffuse Infrared Background Experiment (DIRBE) on the Cosmic Background Explorer ( COBE) spacecraft was designed primarily to conduct a systematic search for an isotropic cosmic infrared background (CIB) in ten photometric bands from 1.25 to 240 µm. The results of that search are presented here. Conservative limits on the CIB are obtained from the minimum observed brightness in all-sky maps at each wavelength, with the faintest limits in the DIRBE spectral range being at 3.5 µm ( I < 64 n W m^-2 sr ^-1, 95% CL) and at 240 µm ( I < 28 n W m^-2 sr^-1, 95% CL). The bright foregrounds from interplanetary dust scattering and emission, stars, and interstellar dust emission are the principal impediments to the DIRBE measurements of the CIB. These foregrounds have been modeled and removed from the sky maps. Assessment of the random and systematic uncertainties in the residuals and tests for isotropy show that only the 140 and 240 µm data provide candidate detections of the CIB. The residuals and their uncertainties provide CIB upper limits more restrictive than the dark sky limits at wavelengths from 1.25 to 100 µm. No plausible solar system or Galactic source of the observed 140 and 240 µm residuals can be identified, leading to the conclusion that the CIB has been detected at levels of I= 25±7 and 14±3 n W m^-2 sr^-1 at 140 and 240 µm respectively. The integrated energy from 140 to 240 µm, 10.3 n W m^-2 sr^-1 is about twice the integrated optical light from the galaxies in the Hubble Deep Field, suggesting that star formation might have been heavily enshrouded by dust at high redshift. The detections and upper limits reported here provide new constraints on models of the history of energy-releasing processes and dust production since the decoupling of the cosmic microwave background from matter.

Status:

Appeared in: The Astrophysical Journal, 508:25-43, 1998 November 20

Affiliations:

¹) Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Drive Baltimore, MD 2121
²) Raytheon STX, Code 685, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771
³) Code 685, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771
⁴) California Institute of Technology, IPAC/JPL, MS 100-22, Pasadena, CA 91125
⁵) UCSB, Physics Department, Santa Barbara, CA 93106
⁶) Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Space Sciences Laboratory, Department of Physics, UC Berkeley, CA 94720
⁷) Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Room 20F-001, Department of Physics, Cambridge, MA 02139
⁸) Princeton University, Department of Physics, Jadwin Hall, Box 708, Princeton, NJ 08544
⁹) UCLA, Astronomy Department, Los Angeles, CA 90024