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The Infrared Glow of First Stars

R. Salvaterra·M. Magliocchetti·A. Ferrara·R. Schneider
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Abstract

Kashlinsky et al. (2005) find a significant cosmic infrared background fluctuation excess on angular scales >50 arcsec that cannot be explained by instrumental noise or local foregrounds. The excess has been tentatively attributed to emission from primordial very massive (PopIII) stars formed <200 Myr after the Big Bang. Using an evolutionary model motivated by independent observations and including various feedback processes, we find that PopIII stars can contribute <40% of the total background intensity (νJ_ν~ 1-2 nW m^-2 sr^-1 in the 0.8-8 \mum range) produced by all galaxies (hosting both PopIII and PopII stars) at z>5. The infrared fluctuation excess is instead very precisely accounted by the clustering signal of galaxies at z>5, predominantly hosting PopII stars with masses and properties similar to the present ones.

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R. Salvaterra, M. Magliocchetti, A. Ferrara, R. Schneider. 2006-01-16. The Infrared Glow of First Stars. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-3933.2006.00145.x

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