J/MNRAS/427/679       Deep blank field catalogue      (Jimenez-Esteban+, 2012)

Deep blank field catalogue for medium- and large-size telescopes. Jimenez-Esteban F.M., Cabrera-Lavers A., Cardiel N., Alacid J.M. <Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 427, 679 (2012)> =2012MNRAS.427..679J 2012MNRAS.427..679J
ADC_Keywords: Photographic catalog ; Photometry Keywords: methods: data analysis - methods: numerical - catalogues - virtual observatory tools Abstract: The observation of blank fields, defined as regions of the sky that are devoid of stars down to a given threshold magnitude, constitutes one of the most relevant calibration procedures required for the proper reduction of astronomical data obtained following typical observing strategies. In this work, we have used the Delaunay triangulation to search for deep blank fields throughout the whole sky, with a minimum size of 10-arcmin in diameter and an increasing threshold magnitude from 15 to 18 in the R band of the USNO-B Catalog of the United States Naval Observatory. The result is a catalogue with the deepest blank fields known so far. A short sample of these regions has been tested with the 10.4m Gran Telescopio Canarias, and it has been shown to be extremely useful for medium and large size telescopes. Because some of the regions found could also be suitable for new extragalactic studies, we have estimated the galactic extinction in the direction of each deep blank field. This catalogue is accessible through the Virtual Observatory tool TESELA, and the user can retrieve - and visualise using Aladin - the deep blank fields available near a given position in the sky. Description: The tables contain the deep blank fields regions obtained from the triangulation. Data are structured in 4 tables, each corresponding to a different threshold magnitude: 15, 16, 17 and 18, respectively. The fifth table contains the short list of selected deep blank fields for both hemispheres. File Summary: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FileName Lrecl Records Explanations -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ReadMe 80 . This file table1.dat 165 77277 Deep blank field catalogue for 15mag threshold table2.dat 165 6062 Deep blank field catalogue for 16mag threshold table3.dat 165 332 Deep blank field catalogue for 17mag threshold table4.dat 165 74 Deep blank field catalogue for 18mag threshold table5.dat 116 90 Short list of selected deep blank fields -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Byte-by-byte Description of file: table1.dat table2.dat table3.dat table4.dat -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bytes Format Units Label Explanations -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1- 10 F10.6 deg RAdeg Right ascension (J2000) 12- 21 F10.6 deg DEdeg Declination (J2000) 23- 24 I2 h RAh Right ascension (J2000) 26- 27 I2 min RAm Right ascension (J2000) 29- 33 F5.2 s RAs Right ascension (J2000) 35 A1 --- DE- Declination sign 36- 37 I2 deg DEd Declination (J2000) 39- 40 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (J2000) 42- 45 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (J2000) 47- 68 F22.18 deg GLON Galactic longitude (IAU1958) 70- 90 F21.17 deg GLAT Galactic latitude (IAU1958) 92- 96 F5.2 arcmin Radius Deep blank field radius 98-100 I3 --- N17.5 Number of stars brighter than 17.5mag 102-105 I4 --- N22.0 Number of stars brighter than 22.0mag 107-111 F5.2 mag Rmax Rmag of the faintest star in the field 113-117 F5.2 mag Rmin Rmag of the brightest star in the field 119-126 E8.2 cW/m2/nm Flux Integrated flux in the field (in erg/cm2/s/Å) 128-134 F7.4 mag E(B-V) Interstellar extinction at the center of the field 136-142 F7.4 mag <E(B-V)> Mean interstellar extinction in the field 144-149 E6.2 mag st<E(B-V)> Standard deviation of the mean interstellar extinction in the field 151-157 F7.4 mag E(B-V)M Maximum interstellar extinction in the field 159-165 F7.4 mag E(B-V)m Minumum interstellar extinction in the field -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Byte-by-byte Description of file: table5.dat -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bytes Format Units Label Explanations -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1- 2 I2 h RAh Right ascension (J2000) 4- 5 I2 min RAm Right ascension (J2000) 7- 11 F5.2 s RAs Right ascension (J2000) 13 A1 --- DE- Declination sign (J2000) 14- 15 I2 deg DEd Declination (J2000) 17- 18 I2 arcmin DEm Declination (J2000) 20- 23 F4.1 arcsec DEs Declination (J2000) 25- 34 F10.6 deg GLON Galactic Longitude (IAU1958) 36- 45 F10.6 deg GLAT Galactic Latitude (IAU1958) 46- 50 F5.2 arcmin Radius DBF radius 52- 54 I3 --- N17.5 Number of stars brighter than 17.5mag 56- 58 I3 --- N22.0 Number of stars brighter than 22.0mag 60- 64 F5.2 mag Rmax Rmag of the faintest star in the field 66- 70 F5.2 mag Rmin Rmag of the brightest star in the field 72- 79 E8.2 cW/m2/nm Flux Integrated flux in the field (in erg/s/cm2/Å) 81- 87 F7.4 mag E(B-V) Interstellar extinction at the center of the field 89- 94 E6.4 mag <E(B-V)> Mean interstellar extinction in the field 96-100 E5.2 mag st<E(B-V)> Standard deviation of the mean interstellar extinction in the field 102-108 F7.4 mag E(B-V)M Maximum interstellar extinction in the field 110-116 F7.4 mag E(B-V)m Minumum interstellar extinction in the field -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(End) Patricia Vannier [CDS] 25-Sep-2012
The document above follows the rules of the Standard Description for Astronomical Catalogues; from this documentation it is possible to generate f77 program to load files into arrays or line by line