Galaxies 09: Assembly, Gas Content and Star Formation History of Galaxies

Andrew Blain
Caltech

The Herschel multi-tiered Extragalactic Survey (HerMES): ALMA Synergies

The ESA-led Herschel mission was launched on May 14th 2009. Herschel will study this emission from 70 to 600 microns, spanning the peak of this cosmic infrared background. In addition, information concerning the Japanese Akari all-sky survey is becoming available and NASA's Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) is scheduled to launch on 7th December. Herschel is extremely complementary to ALMA. While both probe obscured emission, ALMA provides much higher resolution, sensitivity and powerful spectral diagnostics while Herschel samples the peak of the spectral energy distributions of galaxies, has no concerns about atmospheric windows and provides a much higher mapping speed. Several large legacy programs have been approved for Herschel. The guaranteed-time Herschel multi-tiered Extragalactic Survey (HerMES) aims to characterize the bolometric emission from obscured galaxies and map this star-formation history both temporally and spatially. HerMES is the largest Herschel project, involving 900 hours or ~5% of the mission. It will map over 70 square degrees including most famous deep extragalactic survey fields. HerMES will detect over 100,000 such galaxies (building on the few 100 sub-mm galaxies found using ground-based telescopes today), and will provide an invaluable legacy for studies of galaxy evolution at all wavelengths. I will place the HerMES in the context of existing and future multi- wavelength surveys, and In focus on the power of the WISE and Herschel surveys to provide target samples for ALMA.

Return to the Conference Program