HerMES: deep number counts at 250 μm, 350 μm and 500 μm in the COSMOS and GOODS-N fields and the build-up of the cosmic infrared background

By M. B'ethermin, É. Le Floc'h, O. Ilbert, A. Conley, G. Lagache, A. Amblard, V. Arumugam, H. Aussel, S. Berta, J. Bock and 51 more. 2012

174 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Aims. The Spectral and Photometric Imaging REceiver (SPIRE) onboard the Herschel space telescope has provided confusion limited maps of deep fields at 250 μm, 350 μm, and 500 μm, as part of the Herschel Multi-tiered Extragalactic Survey (HerMES). Unfortunately, due to confusion, only a small fraction of the cosmic infrared background (CIB) can be resolved into individually-detected sources. Our goal is to produce deep galaxy number counts and redshift distributions below the confusion limit at SPIRE wavelengths (~20 mJy), which we then use to place strong constraints on the origins of the cosmic infrared background and on models of galaxy evolution. Methods. We individually extracted the bright SPIRE sources (>20 mJy) in the COSMOS field with a method using the positions, the flux densities, and the redshifts of the 24 μm sources as a prior, and derived the number counts and redshift distributions of the bright SPIRE sources. For fainter SPIRE sources (<20 mJy), we reconstructed the number counts and the redshift distribution below the confusion limit using the deep 24 μm catalogs associated with photometric redshift and information provided by the stacking of these sources into the deep SPIRE maps of the GOODS-N and COSMOS fields. Finally, by integrating all these counts, we studied the contribution of the galaxies to the CIB as a function of their flux density and redshift. Results. Through stacking, we managed to reconstruct the source counts per redshift slice down to ~2 mJy in the three SPIRE bands, which lies about a factor 10 below the 5σ confusion limit. Our measurements place tight constraints on source population models. None of the pre-existing models are able to reproduce our results at better than 3-σ. Finally, we extrapolate our counts to zero flux density in order to derive an estimate of the total contribution of galaxies to the CIB, finding 10.1_(-2.3)^(+2.6) nW m^(-2) sr^(-1), 6.5_(-1.6)^(+1.7) nW m^(-2) sr^(-1), and 2.8_(-0.8)^(+0.9) nW m^(-2) sr^(-1) at 250 μm, 350 μm, and 500 μm, respectively. These values agree well with FIRAS absolute measurements, suggesting our number counts and their extrapolation are sufficient to explain the CIB. We find that half of the CIB is emitted at z = 1.04, 1.20, and 1.25, respectively. Finally, combining our results with other works, we estimate the energy budget contained in the CIB between 8 μm and 1000 μm: 26_(-3)^(+7) nW m^(-2) sr^(-1).

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Nuclear and High Energy Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/fc196477d7c2214b36483e7ebbf40c6d6ac0dae2

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Citations in the corpus

The evolution of the dust temperatures of galaxies in the SFR–M∗ plane up to z ~ 2 (2013, methodology): “…in the SFR−M∗ plane is also important to test the accuracy of FIR spectral energy distribution (SED) libraries routinely used to infer total infrared luminosities from monochromatic observations, or used in backward evolutionary models (see e.g., Valiante et al. 2009; Béthermin et al. 2012a).”
GOODS-HERSCHEL: STAR FORMATION, DUST ATTENUATION, AND THE FIR–RADIO CORRELATION ON THE MAIN SEQUENCE OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES UP TO z ≃ 4 (2014, methodology): “…are deemed more accurate than methods based on bolometric correction extrapolation of singleIR band measurements because they use the more extended photometric information that can also account for the slight evolution in redshift of the median IR SED (Magdis et al. 2012; Béthermin et al. 2012a).”
Evolution of the dust emission of massive galaxies up to z=4 and constraints on their dominant mode of star formation (2014, methodology): “This effect has been discussed in detail by several authors (e.g., Bavouzet 2008; Béthermin et al. 2010b, 2012b; Kurczynski & Gawiser 2010; Bourne et al. 2012; Viero et al. 2013).”
THE EVOLVING INTERSTELLAR MEDIUM OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES SINCE z = 2 AS PROBED BY THEIR INFRARED SPECTRAL ENERGY DISTRIBUTIONS (2012, methodology): “• 250, 350 and 500µm: We use the GOODSHerschel SPIRE (Elbaz et al. 2011) data and the mean of pixels centred on sources as in Béthermin et al. (2012a).”
Planck 2013 results. XXX. Cosmic infrared background measurements and implications for star formation (2013, methodology): “(56) We assume the shot-noise levels given by the sum of the values quoted in Tables 6 and 7, from Béthermin et al. (2012a) and Tucci et al. (2011), respectively, and we assume flat priors around them with width given by their 1σ error.”
The evolution of the dust and gas content in galaxies (2013, methodology): “This effect may result in an overestimation of the flux in blended sources (see, e.g., Béthermin et al. 2012; or Magnelli et al. 2014).”
Star-forming galaxies as the origin of diffuse high-energy backgrounds: gamma-ray and neutrino connections, and implications for starburst history (2014, background): “Strong evolution in both luminosity and density has been found, indicating that IR galaxies were more luminous and more numerous in the past [27–31].”
GOODS-ALMA: 1.1 mm galaxy survey (2018, methodology): “This simulation, called SIDES (Simulated Infrared Dusty Extragalactic Sky), updates the Béthermin et al. (2012) model.”
Herschel PEP/HerMES: the redshift evolution (0 ≤ z ≤ 4) of dust attenuation and of the total (UV+IR) star formation rate density (2013, methodology): “At z = 3− 4, the decrease observed in the SFRD is not unexpected: most high redshift studies clearly suggest such a trend through rest-frame UV observations (Hopkins & Beacom(2006), Bouwens et al.(2011)) and predicted by Béthermin et al.(2012a).”
A UNIFIED EMPIRICAL MODEL FOR INFRARED GALAXY COUNTS BASED ON THE OBSERVED PHYSICAL EVOLUTION OF DISTANT GALAXIES (2012, methodology): “Since the LF evolution and number counts may be degenerate (Béthermin et al. 2012b), galaxy counts split per redshift provide a powerful test of the validity of our model (note that S12 demonstrated that bolometric IR LF are reproduced at z<2.5).”