Infrared Absolute Calibration I: Comparison of Sirius with Fainter Calibration Stars

TL;DR

This paper establishes a method to accurately transfer the absolute flux calibration from Sirius, a bright standard star, to fainter stars suitable for modern telescopes like JWST, ensuring precise infrared measurements.

Contribution

It introduces Sirius as a fiducial standard for infrared calibration and demonstrates transferring its flux to fainter stars with high accuracy, facilitating better calibration for advanced telescopes.

Findings

Sirius has accurate flux measurements with 1-2% uncertainty.

Flux transfer to BD +60 1753 is consistent within ~1%.

Calibration extended to GSPC P330-E using theoretical spectra.

Abstract

A challenge in absolute calibration is to relate very bright stars with physical flux measurements to faint ones within range of modern instruments, e.g. those on large groundbased telescopes or on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). We propose Sirius as the fiducial color standard: it is an A0V star that is slowly rotating and does not have infrared excesses either due to hot dust or a planetary debris disk; it also has a number of accurate (~ 1 - 2%) absolute flux measurements. We transfer the near infrared flux from Sirius accurately to BD +60 1753, an unobscured early A-type star (A1V, V ~ 9.6, E(B-V) ~ 0.009) that is faint enough to serve as a primary absolute flux calibrator for JWST. Its near-infrared spectral energy distribution and that of Sirius should be virtually identical. We have determined its output relative to that of Sirius in a number of different ways, all of which give consistent results within ~ 1%. We also transfer the calibration to GSPC P330-E, a well calibrated close solar analog (G2V). We have emphasized the 2MASS K_S band since it represents a large number and long history of measurements, but theoretical spectra (i.e., from CALSPEC) of these stars can be used to extend this result throughout the near- and mid-infrared.