A brief overview on the current status of the census of the early universe population is given. Observational surveys of high redshift galaxies provide direct opportunities to witness the cosmic dawn and to have better understanding of how and when infant galaxies evolve into mature ones. It is a much more astronomical approach in contrast to the physical approach of to study the spatial fluctuation of cosmic microwave radiation. Recent findings in these two areas greatly advanced our understanding of the early Universe. I will describe the basic properties of several target objects we are looking for and the concrete methods astronomers are using to discover those objects in early Universe. My talk starts with Lyman α emitters and Lyman break galaxies, then introduces a clever approach to use gravitational lensing effect of clusters of galaxies to detect distant faint galaxies behind the clusters. Finally I will touch on the status and prospects of surveys for quasars and gamma-ray bursts.

Date Published: 14 July 2008
PDF: 10 pages
Proc. SPIE 7016, Observatory Operations: Strategies, Processes, and Systems II, 701602 (14 July 2008); doi: 10.1117/12.807875

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 7016:
Observatory Operations: Strategies, Processes, and Systems II
Roger J. Brissenden; David R. Silva, Editor(s)