Observations of the Hubble Deep Field with the Infrared Space Observatory - III. Source counts and P(D) analysis

Oliver, S. J.; Goldschmidt, P.; Franceschini, A.; Serjeant, S. B. G.; Efstathiou, A.; Verma, A.; Gruppioni, C.; Eaton, N.; Mann, R. G.; Mobasher, B.; Pearson, C. P.; Rowan-Robinson, M.; Sumner, T. J.; Danese, L.; Elbaz, D.; Egami, E.; Kontizas, M.; Lawrence, A.; McMahon, R.; Norgaard-Nielsen, H. U.; Perez-Fournon, I.; Gonzalez-Serrano, J. I.
Bibliographical reference

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 289, Issue 2, pp. 471-481.

Advertised on:
8
1997
Number of authors
22
IAC number of authors
1
Citations
92
Refereed citations
73
Description
We present source counts at 6.7 and 15 μm from our maps of the Hubble Deep Field (HDF) region, reaching 38.6 muJy at 6.7 μm and 255 muJy at 15 mum. These are the first ever extragalactic number counts to be presented at 6.7 mum, and are three decades fainter than IRAS at 12 mum. Both source counts and a P(D) analysis suggest that we have reached the Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) confusion limit at 15 mum: this will have important implications for future space missions. These data provide an excellent reference point for other ongoing ISO surveys. A no-evolution model at 15 μm is ruled out at >3sigma, while two models which fit the steep IRAS 60-μm counts are acceptable. This provides important confirmation of the strong evolution seen in IRAS surveys. One of these models can then be ruled out from the 6.7-μm data.