Dust Emission from the First Galaxies

DE ROSSI, MARÍA EMILIA; BROMM, VOLKER

Conferencia; Distant Galaxies from the Far South; 2017

We construct analytical models for studying dust emission from the first galaxies, exploring different grain size distributions and chemical compositions.  For typical dwarf-size galaxies at redshifts z ∼ 10, the peak of dust emission occurs at an observed wavelength of  ~500 µm. The predicted flux from these sources is below the capabilities of current and upcoming observatories, but is a target for next-generation telescopes. Our results suggest that primeval galactic systems would contribute to the observed FIR/sub-mm extragalactic background light (EBL), although their imprint is hidden in dominant foregrounds. Considering the strong dependence of our model EBL on the dust-to-metal ratio, we infer that estimates of the FIR/sub-mm EBL could provide important constraints on the amount of dust in the early Universe.