Zodiacal Infrared Foreground Prediction for Space Based Infrared Interferometer Missions

Abstract

The zodiacal foreground for a highly sensitive space infrared interferometer is predicted for various observing locations. For the predictions we use a model that was derived from measurements of the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE). We find that at a wavelength of $10\mu \mathrm{m}$ 96% of the sky is darker than $1MJy{\mathrm{sr}}^{-1}$ for observations in the ecliptic plane at $5\mathrm{AU}$, and 83% is darker than $0.1\mathrm{MJy}{\mathrm{sr}}^{-1}$. At $1\mathrm{AU}$, however, always more than 50% of the sky are brighter than $1\mathrm{MJy}{\mathrm{sr}}^{-1}$, even if the observations are made from $30^{\circ }$ or $60^{\circ }$ of latitude above the ecliptic plane, at 10 or $20\mu \mathrm{m}$. Thus, according to the employed model, the foreground reduction by increasing the heliocentric distance of the observing location is more effective than by increasing the latitude.

10 pages, 3 figures, 1 table, to appear in Astrophysics and Space Science

References in corpus (1)

• The COBE Diffuse Infrared Background Experiment Search for the Cosmic Infrared Background: II. Model of the Interplanetary Dust Cloud

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• Infrared Space Observatories: How to Mitigate Zodiacal Dust Intereference
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