J/AJ/144/127 204 galaxy candidates from VVV infrared photometry (Amores+, 2012)
Galaxies behind the Galactic plane: first results and perspectives from the
VVV survey.
Amores E.B., Sodre L., Minniti D., Alonso M.V., Padilla N., Gurovich S.,
Arsenijevic V., Tollerud E.J., Rodriguez-Ardila A., Diaz Tello J.,
Lucas P.W.
<Astron. J., 144, 127 (2012)>
=2012AJ....144..127A 2012AJ....144..127A
ADC_Keywords: Galaxy catalogs ; Photometry, infrared
Keywords: galaxies: fundamental parameters - galaxies: general -
Galaxy: structure - ISM: structure, surveys
Abstract:
VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) is an ESO variability survey
that is performing observations in near-infrared bands (ZY JHKs)
toward the Galactic bulge and part of the disk with the completeness
limits at least 3mag deeper than Two Micron All Sky Survey. In the
present work, we searched in the VVV survey data for background
galaxies near the Galactic plane using ZY JHKs photometry that
covers 1.636deg2. We identified 204 new galaxy candidates by
analyzing colors, sizes, and visual inspection of multi-band (ZY
JHKs) images. The galaxy candidate colors were also compared with
the predicted ones by star count models considering a more realistic
extinction model at the same completeness limits observed by VVV. A
comparison of the galaxy candidates with the expected one by
Millennium simulations is also presented. Our results increase the
number density of known galaxies behind the Milky Way by more than one
order of magnitude. A catalog with galaxy properties including
ellipticity, Petrosian radii, and ZY JHKsmagnitudes is provided, as
well as comparisons of the results with other surveys of galaxies
toward the Galactic plane.
Description:
VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) is an ESO public variability
survey with the 4m VISTA telescope at Cerro Paranal. It consists of
observations in the near-infrared bands (Z, Y, J, H, and Ks) toward
the Galactic bulge and part of the disk, covering in total an area of
562deg2. VVV is in its third year (for a detailed description of the
survey status, see Saito et al. 2012A&A...537A.107S 2012A&A...537A.107S). The completeness
limit of the observations in the five infrared bands is 21.6mag in Z,
20.9 in Y, 20.6 in J, 19.0 in H, and 20.0mag in Ks.
This present work is the first of a series of papers that unveils
galaxies in the Galactic plane using deep VVV near-infrared
photometry. The results presented here were obtained in a region
toward l=298.3558°, b=-1.6497° (called the VVV d003 region)
and centered at (J2000) R.A.=12:09:17.18 and decl.=-64:08:46.7. This
field covers 1.636 deg2 (Δl∼1.475° and Δb∼1.109°).
File Summary:
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FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
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ReadMe 80 . This file
table2.dat 109 204 Galaxy candidates properties
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See also:
VII/233 : The 2MASS Extended sources (IPAC/UMass, 2003-2006)
VII/242 : LEDA galaxies with DENIS measurements catalog (Paturel+, 2005)
J/A+A/554/A123 : NIR catalog of Galactic novae in VVV survey area
(Saito+, 2013)
J/A+A/552/A74 : NIR photometry of Galactic PNe with VVV Survey
(Weidmann+, 2013)
J/A+A/532/A131 : New Galactic star clusters in VVV survey (Borissova+, 2011)
J/A+A/505/1049 : Parkes HI observations behind Milky Way (Schroeder+, 2009)
J/A+A/505/29 : HI observations of 2MASS galaxies in ZoA (van Driel+, 2009)
J/A+A/466/481 : Near-infrared survey around PKS 1343-601 (Schroeder+, 2007)
J/ApJ/662/224 : Second CIZA subsample (Kocevski+, 2007)
J/AJ/134/2398 : Stellar SEDs in SDSS and 2MASS filters (Covey+, 2007)
J/MNRAS/369/1131 : Structures in the GA region (Radburn-Smith+, 2006)
J/A+A/415/9 : Redshifts behind the Southern Milky Way (Woudt+, 2004)
J/AJ/128/16 : HIPASS Bright Galaxy Catalog (Koribalski+, 2004)
J/MNRAS/354/980 : Near-infrared survey around PKS 1343-601 (Nagayama+, 2004)
J/AJ/124/1954 : 1000 brightest HIPASS galaxies catalog (Ryan-Weber+, 2002)
J/A+A/391/887 : Redshifts in the Hydra/Antlia Extension
(Kraan-Korteweg+, 2002)
J/A+A/380/441 : Galaxies behind Southern Milky Way. II. (Woudt+, 2001)
J/A+AS/141/123 : Galaxies behind Southern Milky Way. I. (Kraan-Korteweg 2000)
J/A+A/352/39 : Great Attractor region redshifts (Woudt+, 1999)
J/A+AS/127/463 : Crux region redshifts (Fairall+ 1998)
J/A+A/297/617 : Hydra/Antlia extension redshifts (Kraan-Korteweg+, 1995)
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table2.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 3 I3 --- Seq Running sequence number
5- 14 F10.6 deg GLON Galactic longitude
16- 24 F9.6 deg GLAT Galactic latitude
26- 31 F6.3 mag Zmag ? VISTA Z band magnitude
33- 37 F5.3 mag e_Zmag ? Uncertainty in Zmag
39- 44 F6.3 mag Ymag ? VISTA Y band magnitude
46- 50 F5.3 mag e_Ymag ? Uncertainty in Ymag
52- 57 F6.3 mag Jmag ? VISTA J band magnitude
59- 63 F5.3 mag e_Jmag ? Uncertainty in Jmag
65- 70 F6.3 mag Hmag ? VISTA H band magnitude
72- 76 F5.3 mag e_Hmag ? Uncertainty in Hmag
78- 83 F6.3 mag Kmag ? VISTA Ks band magnitudes
85- 89 F5.3 mag e_Kmag ? Uncertainty in Kmag
91- 95 F5.2 pix Rad Source Petrosian radius
97-101 F5.3 --- e [0/1]? Source ellipticity
103-107 F5.1 deg PA [0/180]? Ellipse position angle
109 I1 --- C [1/2] Object classification from this work (1)
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Note (1): Class as follows:
1 = Type I source (possible galaxy) have galaxy features and are
photometrically consistent with those expected for galaxies;
2 = Type II source (likely galaxy) do not have clear Galactic features, but are
photometrically consistent with galaxies and do not appear to have PSF-like
shapes. For Type II, additional verification is necessary.
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History:
From electronic version of the journal
(End) Greg Schwarz [AAS], Sylvain Guehenneux [CDS] 25-Oct-2013