While the shape of the extinction curve on the infrared is considered to be set and the extinction ratios between infrared bands are usually taken to be approximately constant, a recent number of studies point either to a spatially variable behavior on the exponent of the power law or to a different extinction law altogether. In this paper, we propose a method to analyze the overall behavior of the interstellar extinction by means of the red-clump population, and we apply it to those areas of the Milky Way where the presence of interstellar matter is heavily felt: areas located in 5 deg<l<30 deg and b=0 deg. We show that the extinction ratios traditionally used for the near infrared could be inappropriate for the inner Galaxy and we analyze the behavior of the extinction law from 1 to 8 microns.
@article{arxiv.1402.0083,
title = {Infrared extinction in the Inner Milky Way through the red clump giants},
author = {Carlos González-Fernández and Andrés Asensio Ramos and Francisco Garzón and Antonio Cabrera-Lavers and Peter L. Hammersley},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1402.0083},
year = {2015}
}