The clustering of merging star-forming haloes: Dust emission as high-frequency CMB foreground

摘要

Future observations of CMB anisotropies will be able to probe high multipoles of the angular power spectrum, corresponding to a resolution of a few arcminutes. Dust emission from merging galaxies is one of the foregrounds that will affect such very small scales We estimate the contribution to CMB angular fluctuations from objects which are bright in the sub-millimeter band due to intense star formation bursts following merging episodes. We base our approach on the Lacey-Cole merger model and on the Kennicutt relation which connects the star formation rate in galaxies with their infrared luminosity. We set the free parameters of the model in order to not exceed the SCUBA source counts, the Madau plot of star formation rate in the Universe and the COBE/FIRAS data on the intensity of the sub-millimeter cosmic background radiation. We show that the angular power spectrum arising from the distribution of such star-forming haloes will be one of the most significant foregrounds in the high-frequency channels of forthcoming CMB experiments, such as PLANCK, ACT and SPT. The correlation term, due to the clustering of multiple merging haloes at redshift z ~ 2-6, is dominant in the broad range of angular scales 200 < I < 3000. Poisson fluctuations due to bright sub-millimeter sources are more important at higher I, but since they are generated from the brightest sources, such contribution could be strongly reduced if blight sources are excised from the sky maps. The contribution of the correlation term to the angular power spectrum depends strongly on the redshift evolution of the escape fraction of UV photons. The measurement of this signal will therefore give important information about the sub-millimeter emission and the escape fraction of UV photons from merging galaxies, in the early stage of their evolution.