infrapunastronomia

Infrared astronomy, or infrapunastronomia in Portuguese, is the branch of astronomy that studies celestial objects and phenomena in the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, roughly from 0.75 to about 1000 micrometers. It complements optical observations by penetrating dust and revealing cool or embedded objects, such as star-forming regions, protostars, brown dwarfs, and planets, as well as tracing thermal emission from dust in galaxies and around active galactic nuclei.

Observing in infrared presents specific challenges. Earth's atmosphere absorbs many infrared wavelengths, so observations are conducted from dry, high-altitude sites or from space. Infrared detectors and telescopes must be cooled to prevent the telescope’s own thermal radiation from swamping faint signals. Instruments span ground-based facilities with adaptive optics and space telescopes dedicated to infrared work, including missions such as IRAS, ISO, Spitzer, Herschel, and the James Webb Space Telescope, along with various ground-based IR arrays and spectrographs.

Infrared astronomy has enabled key discoveries, including the birthplaces of stars inside dense molecular clouds, the structure and evolution of protoplanetary disks, the characterization of exoplanet atmospheres, the properties of dusty, star-forming galaxies in the early universe, and measurements of the cosmic infrared background. By revealing phenomena hidden by interstellar dust and by capturing thermal emission from cool objects, infrared astronomy provides a crucial window on both the formation of stars and planets and the evolution of galaxies.