The Herschel Space Observatory is the European Space Agency's state of the art infrared space telescope launched into space on 14 May 2009, covering the wavelength range from 70-700 microns with 3 instruments SPIRE, PACS and HIFI. Large area surveys are being carried out by Herschel in the AKARI legacy fields at the North and South Ecliptic Poles and the AKARI All-Sky Survey provides additional synergy with the largest survey with Herschel, H-ATLAS, covering more than 500 square degrees. This paper reports on some of the early results of these synergies between Herschel and AKARI including the first comparison of the AKARI All-Sky Survey number counts with the deeper Herschel surveys.

This paper presents Hα emission line detections for four galaxies at z > 3.5 made with AKARI as part of the FUHYU mission program. These are the highest-redshift Hα detections to date in star-forming galaxies. AKARI's unique near-infrared spectroscopic capability has made these detections possible. For two of these galaxies, this represents the first evidence of their redshifts and confirms their physical association with a companion radio galaxy. The star formation rates (SFRs) estimated from the Hα lines under-predict the SFRs estimated from their far-infrared luminosities by a factor of ~ 2 - 3. We have also detected broad Hα components in the two radio galaxies which indicate the presence of quasars.

ASTRO-F is the next generation Japanese infrared space mission of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science. ASTRO-F will be dedicated to an All Sky Survey in the far-infrared in 4 bands from 50-200microns with 2 additional mid-infrared bands at 9microns and 20microns. This will be the first all sky survey in the infrared since the ground breaking IRAS mission almost 20 years ago and the first ever survey at 170microns. The All Sky Survey should detect 10's of millions of sources in the far-infrared bands most of which will be dusty luminous and ultra-luminous star forming galaxies, with as many as half lying at redshifts greater than unity. In this contribution, the ASTRO-F mission and its objectives are reviewed and many of the mission expectations are discussed.