An AKARI Search for Intracluster Dust of Globular Clusters

TL;DR

This study used AKARI infrared observations to search for intracluster dust in globular clusters, finding mostly upper limits and one candidate, and discussing dust lifetime and removal mechanisms.

Contribution

It provides new upper limits on intracluster dust mass in globular clusters and identifies a potential intracluster dust candidate using AKARI data.

Findings

Most clusters lack detectable intracluster dust.

Upper limits on dust mass range from 1.0E-05 to 1.0E-03 solar masses.

The inferred dust lifetime is shorter than 50 Myr, suggesting active dust removal.

Abstract

We report the observations of 12 globular clusters with the AKARI/FIS. Our goal is to search for emission from the cold dust within clusters. We detect diffuse emissions toward NGC 6402 and 2808, but the IRAS 100-micron maps show the presence of strong background radiation. They are likely emitted from the galactic cirrus, while we cannot rule out the possible association of a bump of emission with the cluster in the case of NGC 6402. We also detect 28 point-like sources mainly in the WIDE-S images (90 micron). At least several of them are not associated with the clusters but background galaxies based on some external catalogs. We present the SEDs by combining the near-and-mid infrared data obtained with the IRC if possible. The SEDs suggest that most of the point sources are background galaxies. We find one candidate of the intracluster dust which has no mid-infrared counterpart unlike the other point-like sources, although some features such as its point-like appearance should be explained before we conclude its intracluster origin. For most of the other clusters, we have confirmed the lack of the intracluster dust. We evaluate upper limits of the intracluster dust mass to be between 1.0E-05 and 1.0E-03 solar mass depending on the dust temperature. The lifetime of the intracluster dust inferred from the upper limits is shorter than 5 Myr (T=70K) or 50 Myr (35K). Such short lifetime indicates some mechanism(s) are at work to remove the intracluster dust. We also discuss its impact on the chemical evolution of globular clusters.