• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.27.2-27.2
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• 2021

The unknown excess emission in the near-infrared is thought to be related to the evolution of galaxies in the early epoch of Universe. Due to its extremely faint brightness, it can be observed only in space. Many infrared space missions have been tried to trace the origin of the Cosmic Infrared Background through the measurement of its absolute brightness and its spatial fluctuation. In addition, the infrared observations can address questions ranging from the origin of first galaxies in the Universe to the formation of stars. I will overview the Korean infrared space missions and introduce the status of the recent international collaboration mission, SPHEREx.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.52.1-52.1
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• 2010

The Japanese infrared (IR) space mission AKARI monitored the brightness in the fields very close to the north ecliptic pole (NEP) with nine wavebands in Infrared Camera (IRC), which cover the wavelength range from 2 to $24{\mu}m$. We reduced the NEP monitor observations and examined the smoothness of the sky background brightness. Our analysis shows that the background brightness is smooth over a frame of about $10'\times10'$ within about 0.1% deviation in mid-IR. Because the zodiacal light (ZL) and emission (ZE) dominate the diffuse sky brightness in the near- and mid-IR wavelengths, the background brightness varies with season through a year. We tried sinusoidal fittings to the observed NEP background brightness. The fitting analysis shows that the sine function is successful in describing the seasonal variation of the ZL and ZE within 2% deviations from the observed brightness, especially for the 15, 18, and $24{\mu}m$ bands, within 0.3%. These results will provide limits and caveats for the studies of the cosmic infrared background radiation.

• Bulletin of the Korean Space Science Society
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• 2009.10a
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• pp.34.1-34.1
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• 2009

After SNIa and WMAP observations during the last decade, the discovery of the accelerated expansion of the universe is a major challenge to particle physics and cosmology. There are currently three candidates for the dark energy which results in this accelerated expansion: $\cdot$ a non-zero cosmological constant, $\cdot$ a dynamical cosmological constant (quintessence scalar field), $\cdot$ modifications of Einstein's theory of gravity. The scalar field model like quintessence is a simple model with time-dependent w, which is generally larger than -w1. Because the different w lead to a different expansion history of the universe, the geometrical measurements of cosmic expansion through observations of SNIa, CMB and baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) can give us tight constraints on w. One of the interesting ways to study the scalar field dark-energy models is to investigate the coupling between the dark energy and the other matter fields. In fact, a number of models which realize the interaction between dark energy and dark matter, or even visible matter, have been proposed so far. Observations of the effects of these interactions will offer an unique opportunity to detect a cosmological scalar field. In this talk, after briefly reviewing the main idea of the three possible candidates for dark energy and their cosmological phenomena, we discuss the interactinng dark-energy model, paying particular attention to the interacting mechanism between dark energy with a hot dark matter (neutrinos). In this so-called mass-varying neutrino (MVN) model, we calculate explicitly the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation and large-scale structure (LSS) within cosmological perturbation theory. The evolution of the mass of neutrinos is determined by the quintessence scalar field, which is responsible for the cosmic acceleration today.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.47 no.2
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• pp.49-67
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• 2014

A novel method to characterize the topology of the early-universe intergalactic medium during the epoch of cosmic reionization is presented. The 21-cm radiation background from high redshift is analyzed through calculation of the 2-dimensional (2D) genus. The radiative transfer of hydrogen- ionizing photons and ionization-rate equations are calculated in a suite of numerical simulations under various input parameters. The 2D genus is calculated from the mock 21-cm images of high-redshift universe. We construct the 2D genus curve by varying the threshold differential brightness temperature, and compare this to the 2D genus curve of the underlying density field. We find that (1) the 2D genus curve reflects the evolutionary track of cosmic reionization and (2) the 2D genus curve can discriminate between certain reionization scenarios and thus indirectly probe the properties of radiation-sources. Choosing the right beam shape of a radio antenna is found crucial for this analysis. Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is found to be a suitable apparatus for this analysis in terms of sensitivity, even though some deterioration of the data for this purpose is unavoidable under the planned size of the antenna core.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.353-356
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• 2012

We present new constraints on the cosmic optical background (COB) obtained from an analysis of the Pioneer 10/11 Imaging Photopolarimeter (IPP) data. After careful examination of the data quality, the usable measurements free from the zodiacal light are integrated into sky maps at the blue (${\sim}0.44{\mu}m$) and red (${\sim}0.64{\mu}m$) bands. Accurate starlight subtraction was achieved by referring to all-sky star catalogs and a Galactic stellar population synthesis model down to 32.0 mag. We find that the residual light is separated into two components: one component shows a clear correlation with the thermal $100{\mu}m$ brightness, whilst the other shows a constant level in the lowest $100{\mu}m$ brightness region. The presence of the second component is significant after all the uncertainties and possible residual light in the Galaxy are taken into account, thus it most likely has an extragalactic origin (i.e., the COB). The derived COB brightness is ($(1.8{\pm}0.9){\times}10^{-9}$ and $(1.2{\pm}0.9){\times}10^{-9}\;erg\;s^{-1}\;cm^{-2}\;sr^{-1}\;{\AA}^{-1}$ in the blue and red spectral regions, respectively, or $7.9{\pm}4.0$ and $7.7{\pm}5.8\;nW\;m^{-2}\;sr^{-1}$. Based on a comparison with the integrated brightness of galaxies, we conclude that the bulk of the COB is comprised of normal galaxies which have already been resolved by the current deepest observations. There seems to be little room for contributions from other populations including "first stars" at these wavelengths. On the other hand, the first component of the IPP residual light represents the diffuse Galactic light (DGL)-scattered starlight by the interstellar dust. We derive the mean DGL-to-$100{\mu}m$ brightness ratios of $2.1{\times}10^{-3}$ and $4.6{\times}10^{-3}$ at the two bands, which are roughly consistent with previous observations toward denser dust regions. Extended red emission in the diffuse interstellar medium is also confirmed.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.75-91
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• 2013

We estimate the power spectra of the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) temperature anisotropy in localized regions of the sky using the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) 7-year data. We find that the north and south hat regions at high Galactic latitude ($|b|{\geq}30^{\circ}C$) show an anomaly in the power spectrum amplitude around the third peak, which is statistically significant up to 3. We try to explain the cause of the observed anomaly by analyzing the low Galactic latitude ($|b|$ < $30^{\circ}C$) regions where the galaxy contamination is expected to be stronger, and the regions weakly or strongly dominated byWMAP instrument noise. We also consider the possible effect of unresolved radio point sources. We find another but less statistically significant anomaly in the low Galactic latitude north and south regions whose behavior is opposite to the one at high latitude. Our analysis shows that the observed north-south anomaly at high latitude becomes weaker on regions with high number of observations (weak instrument noise), suggesting that the anomaly is significant at sky regions that are dominated by the WMAP instrument noise. We have checked that the observed north-south anomaly has weak dependences on the bin-width used in the power spectrum estimation, and on the Galactic latitude cut. We also discuss the possibility that the detected anomaly may hinge on the particular choice of the multipole bin around the third peak. We anticipate that the issue of whether or not the anomaly is intrinsic one or due to WMAP instrument noise will be resolved by the forthcoming Planck data.

• Bulletin of the Korean Space Science Society
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.30.2-30.2
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• 2008

The Cosmic Far-Infrared Background (CFIRB) contains information about the number and distribution of contributing sources and thus gives us an important key to understand the evolution of galaxies. In order to detect CFIRB fluctuation effectively, we have to analyze the confusion carefully which sets a fundamental limit to the deep observations. From our deep observations, we can compare the background fluctuation via observations of regions at different Galactic latitudes. Our comparative study between estimated confusion levels from our observations and those from our model enables us to understand the nature of CFIRB. We introduce our CFIRB observations and report the preliminary results.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.625-628
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• 2015

POLARBEAR is a ground-based experiment located in the Atacama desert of northern Chile. The experiment is designed to measure the Cosmic Microwave Background B-mode polarization at several arcminute resolution. The CMB B-mode polarization on degree angular scales is a unique signature of primordial gravitational waves from cosmic inflation and B-mode signal on sub-degree scales is induced by the gravitational lensing from large-scale structure. Science observations began in early 2012 with an array of 1.274 polarization sensitive antenna-couple Transition Edge Sensor (TES) bolometers at 150 GHz. We published the first CMB-only measurement of the B-mode polarization on sub-degree scales induced by gravitational lensing in December 2013 followed by the first measurement of the B-mode power spectrum on those scales in March 2014. In this proceedings, we review the physics of CMB B-modes and then describe the Polarbear experiment, observations, and recent results.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.34.1-34.1
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• 2013

The first generation stars in the universe are not observed as discrete objects by using current observational facilities, but their contributions are redshifted to the near infrared wavelength bands at present universe. Therefore, investigation of background radiation at near infrared is important for the study of the first stars. In this study, we present new observations of spatial fluctuations in sky brightness toward the north ecliptic pole using data from AKARI. Among pointed observation program of AKARI, we used two pointing surveys named Monitor field and NEP wide field at three wavelength bands 2.4, 3.2, and 4.1 ${\mu}m$. To obtain spatial fluctuations from observed images, first of all, we exclude pixels affected by resolved foreground objects and then obtain diffuse map which consists of diffused radiation only. Because the diffuse map contains not only cosmological components but also various foreground components, in order to detect cosmological components, we estimate the contributions of foreground components separately. The results of this study show that there remains excess spatial fluctuation that cannot be explained by known foreground sources. This work is based on observations with AKARI, a JAXA project with the participation of ESA.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.35.1-35.1
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• 2013

The first generation stars in the universe are not observed as discrete objects by using current observational facilities, but their contributions are redshifted to the near infrared wavelength bands at present universe. Therefore, investigation of background radiation at near infrared is important for the study of the first stars. In this study, we present new observations of spatial fluctuations in sky brightness toward the north ecliptic pole using data from AKARI. Among pointed observation program of AKARI, we used two pointing surveys named Monitor field and NEP wide field at three wavelength bands 2.4, 3.2, and 4.1 ${\mu}$. To obtain spatial fluctuations from observed images, first of all, we exclude pixels affected by resolved foreground objects and then obtain diffuse map which consists of diffused radiation only. Because the diffuse map contains not only cosmological components but also various foreground components, in order to detect cosmological components, we estimate the contributions of foreground components separately. The results of this study show that there remains excess spatial fluctuation that cannot be explained by known foreground sources. This work is based on observations with AKARI, a JAXA project with the participation of ESA.