The Background Radiation in Homogeneous Isotropic World-Models, II

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Abstract
In the present paper the assumptions made in Paper I, that the galaxies can be represented as point-sources and that intergalactic space is effectively transparent, are relaxed. General formulae are derived for the background spectrum and bolometric radiation, taking absorption effects into account, and numerical formulae have been calculated for specific world-models assuming currently accepted values of the relevant parameters and a range of possible values of the present mean density of intergalactic matter. We find that, unless the latter is less than or equal to 10 −31 g. cm −3 , the effect of intergalactic dust in reducing the background luminosity predominates over the effect of absorption by intervening galaxies. The effect on the background spectrum tends to reduce the apparent differences between specific models. The possible effect of relaxing the assumption that on the average the galaxies radiate uniformly in time is also considered in a preliminary way, and tentative reasons are given for regarding the results of Paper I as reasonable first approximations for a wide range of models.

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