The Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment-2: An Intensity-mapping Optimized Sounding-rocket Payload to Understand the Near-IR Extragalactic Background Light
Abstract The background light produced by emission from all sources over cosmic history is a powerful diagnostic of structure formation and evolution. At near-infrared wavelengths, this extragalactic background light (EBL) is comprised of emission from galaxies stretching all the way back to the first-light objects present during the Epoch of Reionization. The Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment 2 (CIBER-2) is a sounding-rocket experiment designed to measure both the absolute photometric brightness of the EBL over 0.5–2.0 μ m and perform an intensity-mapping measurement of EBL spatial fluctuations in six broad bands over the same wavelength range. CIBER-2 comprises a 28.5 cm, 80 K telescope that images several square degrees to three separate cameras. Each camera is equipped with an HAWAII-2RG detector covered by an assembly that combines two broadband filters and a linear-variable filter, which perform the intensity mapping and absolute photometric measurements, respectively. CIBER-2 has flown three times: an engineering flight in 2021, a terminated launch in 2023, and a successful science flight in 2024. In this paper, we review the science case for the experiment; describe the factors motivating the instrument design; review the optical, mechanical, and electronic implementation of the instrument; present preflight laboratory characterization measurements; and finally assess the instrument’s performance in flight.
Authors
- Daehee Lee (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7725-5085)
- Yuya Kawano
- Ryo Ohta
- Aoi Takahashi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3881-3202)
- Dale Mercado (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7485-7563)
- Kei Sano (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6468-8532)
- Won-Kee Park (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8292-2556)
- Masaki Furutani
- Richard M. Feder (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9330-8738)
- Phillip Korngut (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0003-8869-3365)
- M. Zemcov (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8253-1451)
- Dorin Patru (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0008-5671-9061)
- Arisa Kida
- Toshiaki Arai
- Yasuhiro Yamada (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5330-234X)
- P. Bangale (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3886-3739)
- Serena Tramm
- Mai Shirahata (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9301-4425)
- Grigory Heaton (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0003-5681-2956)
- Kohji Tsumura (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7143-6520)
- Tomoya Nakagawa
- Candice Fazar (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9925-0146)
- Shiang‐Yu Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6491-1901)
- Chika Matsumi
- Shuji Matsuura (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5698-9634)
- Asantha Cooray
- Seung-Cheol Bang
- J. J. Bock (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5710-5212)
- Kohji Takimoto (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8405-9549)
- Shunsuke Nakagawa (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3299-7370)
- Hiroko Suzuki
- Toshio Matsumoto (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6066-5221)
- Tomoya Kojima
- Shuta Nakahata
- Viktor Hristov
- Chi H. Nguyen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9368-3186)
- R. Hashimoto
- Alicia Lanz (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2565-1558)
- Kazuma Noda (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5756-5964)
- Momoko Tamai
Publication Details
- Journal
- The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series
- Published
- 2025-10-01
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4365/adfc6e
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 1.15