A discussion on infared astronomy - Near infrared night sky background

Abstract

We have carried out near infrared observations on wide fields of the sky, using both a rocket-borne telescope and ground-based equipment. The rocket observations covered the spectral range of 1 to 8 μm. The ground-based observations were carried out in a narrow spectral region around 1.085 μm. The rocket observations give increased sensitivity over a previous flight carried out by one of us in collaboration with D. P. McNutt, K. Shivanandan and B. J. Zajac of the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. We observe a general signal which would not have been detected in our previous flight. This new signal appears to be genuine, but because of a number of difficulties, mainly associated with vent gases, we prefer not to trust these signals until we have been able to carry out a confirming flight. We will, in the present paper, use the observed fluxes as an upper limit to the near infrared radiation incident on the top of the atmosphere.