Description
Organisers: Andrew Blain, David Clements, Stephen Eales, Matt Griffin, Pamela Klassen, Seb Oliver, Kate Pattle, Chris Pearson, Dimitra Rigopoulou, Carole Tucker
Dust is a significant constituent of the ISM, is strongly involved in many important processes on all scales, including star formation, planet formation, ISM enrichment, and AGN structure, and hides the physics and chemistry of these processes behind a veil of obscuration. Observations at mid-IR, far-IR and submm wavelengths provide direct observations of thermal emission from this dust and allow spectroscopy to penetrate the obscuration. With the legacy of Herschel, continuing operations at JCMT and ALMA, with JWST allowing high resolution mid-IR observations, we are at a key point in our ability to understand the dust and gas in obscured regions in nearby systems, and out to the most distant objects known. Forthcoming projects, including the Simons Observatory, PRIMA and AtLAST, will provide critical new insights. This session will explore our current understanding of the dust-obscured universe, examining synergies between local and distant universe studies, and assessing what next steps are needed - observationally, theoretically and in instrumentation - to better understand the role and importance of dust and obscured processes in the universe.
I report on the Planet Earth Building Blocks Legacy e-MERLIN Survey. PEBBLeS is an SKA Cradle of Life forerunner project, and has just completed a census of very large dust grains in massive discs in northern star-forming regions. We uncover where dust is growing large enough to overcome loss processes and so can proceed to make planets. The e-MERLIN resolution is very high and can find the...
Recent years have seen significant improvements in computational codes and hardware, incorporating novel physics and strategies to statistically explore and understand galaxy formation and evolution. A recent addition to this landscape is the COLIBRE (COLd ISM gas and Better REsolution) suite of simulations, built on the open source SWIFT simulation code. The suite of simulations includes the...
Advances in submillimetre dust emission polarimetry are revolutionizing our understanding of the magnetic fields which thread the interstellar media of the Milky Way and other galaxies. In this talk I will discuss the insights which we are gaining into the energy balance, dynamics and evolution of the magnetized interstellar medium from recent observations made with the POL-2 polarimeter on...
The evolution of dust is important for understanding galaxy evolution. More detailed models of dust formation are needed to reproduce observations of dust in galaxies at high redshift, which include high dust-to-stellar mass ratios in z~7 galaxies observed with ALMA. At the same time, the moderate amount of dust at z~14 seen with JWST requires processes such as dust destruction by the...
The bright [CII] 158 micron line can emit up to 1% of a galaxy's far-IR luminosity and has been suggested as an efficient tracer of star-formation in high-redshift galaxies, where it is shifted in to ALMA bands 4โ7. However, a deficit of [CII] relative to IR luminosity is observed in galaxies with L_IR>10^11 L_sun, and the origins of this deficit are not yet fully understood, limiting its...
We use the deep imaging from the JWST PRIMER survey to study the properties of (sub)mm sources detected by ALMA in the centre of the COSMOS field, with the aim of better constraining the history of dust-enshrouded star formation. The wealth of ALMA data in this field enabled us to isolate a robust sample of 128 (sub)mm sources, spanning two decades in (sub)mm flux density. The JWST imaging is...
Current single-dish sub-mm facilities have opened new views of some of the brightest celestial sources, and interferometers have provided the exquisite resolution necessary to analyse the details in small fields. Answering questions with current generation facilities is creating the next generation questions. To go further, what we need is a facility capable of rapidly mapping large portions...
Recently the PRIMA mission was selected by NASA for Phase A study. If it is selected for implementation in April 2026 it will be the first far infrared astrophysics observatory for 22 years when launched in 2031.
The observatory provides unique spectral, imaging and polarimetry capabilities from 24-235 micron with sensitivity orders of magnitude better than predecessors. PRIMA is designed...
