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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 February 2017
The spatial distribution of interstellar dust is clearly important in understanding not only galactic dynamics but also the processing of the dust and the interstellar medium in general. Probably the best spectral region for investigating interstellar dust is the infrared (IR), where the cool dust is likely to radiate. Indeed, one of the most prominent features of the IRAS sky is the ubiquitous cirrus emission, thought to be due to interstellar dust heated by the interstellar radiation field (ISRF), seen at 60 and 100 μm (Low 1984). However, it is difficult to use the cirrus to probe the dust distribution, both because we have no depth information and also because the cirrus, due to its low temperatures (~20 K), is a probe of high-density dust regions. A far more sensitive search could be made if the dust were hotter, that is, in the presence of a greater ultraviolet (UV) flux. We have made use of this fact to search for dust in the vicinity of hot, bright stars, where even a small amount of dust will dominate the total emission along that line of sight.