SWIRE Science Programs

The SWIRE survey will enable many kinds of science. The following are some of the science programs identified by and being pursued by the SWIRE science team:

• Star Formation - one of the primary goals of SWIRE is the study of star formations rates as a function of redshift, galaxy type and environment.
• Spheroids - characterization of the population of massive galaxies and their evolution with time.
• Rare Objects - an active program of spectroscopy and high spatial resolutiion imaging is planned to followup on rare and unusual objects discovered in the SWIRE survey.Because SWIRE is extremely wide, it's sensitivity to low space density objects is higher than other surveys. As an example, a study of comparative morphologies of ULIRGs as a function of redshift is planned.
• Large Scale Structure - SWIRE's large area makes it the most suitable SIRTF survey for studying large scale structure. These includes studies of the star formation rate as a function of 3-d structure, comparisons of the clustering of active and passive systems at high and low redshift, clustering of AGN, and from the ground-based data weak-lensing experiments.
• Galaxy Clusters - comparisons will be made between the x-ray data for the XMM-LSS field and the SWIRE data, allowing an examination of the IR properties of x-ray detected clusters, and the placement of SWIRE sources within the 3-d structure known from the XMM-LSS survey. Clusters will also be searched for directly in the SWIRE survey data. Clusters will also be used as gravitational lenses to study very distant objects normally below the SWIRE detection threshold.
• AGN - the study of active galactic nuclei is a primary goal of SWIRE. The high sensitivity of SWIRE at 24 microns makes it excellent for detecting AGN. Questions to be investigated include the relative contributions of AGN and star formation to the energy density of the universe as a function of redshift, the realtionship between AGN and starbursts, unification of different classes of AGN.
• Mergers - galaxy mergers and other effects of the environments immediately surrounding galaxies strongly affect their evolution. Detailed studies are planned of the morphology of objects such as ULIRGs selected from the SWIRE survey. Studies are also planned of interacting galaxies discovered in the SWIRE ground-based data.
• Nearby Galaxies - in addition to studying distant galaxies, SWIRE will also see many nearby foreground galaxies. Since they are nearby, they will be well-resolved, enabling detailed morphological studies. This will complement the SINGS legacy program by extending to a larger sample of more distant galaxies, including isolated galaxies, interacting galaxies, and groups and clusters.
• Brown Dwarfs - the SWIRE IRAC data will be the deepest survey for brown dwafs ever conducted, and probably the largest such SIRTF survey. Tens of such objects are expected.
• Cirrus - the survey's sensitivity and wide area will enable studies of the structure on many size-scales of high-latitude cirrus (dust) emission in the Milky Way.
• Circumstellar Debris Disks and Evolved Stars - main sequence and pre-main sequence stars with IR excesses are likely candidates for planetary or protoplanetary debris disks. Post-main sequence stars with IR excesses likely have shells or torii of dust produced in their stellar atmospheres.
• Asteroids - the spectral energy distribution of asteroids peaks near 25 microns. SWIRE''s 8 and 24 micron data will be highly effective at finding asteroids down to sizes of 0.5 km. Between one and ten thousand asteroids are expected in our low latitude XMM field.