The Big Faint Quasar Survey

Details The Big Faint Quasar Survey The Big Faint Quasar Survey

Jan 1998

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1998baas...30..768h&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society Meeting, 191, #130.05

Computer Science

Databases

Scientific paper

We present the initial data for a survey for faint z=3.3--5.0 quasars using imaging over 8 deg(2) to B=26.8 (3sigma ), Rgtrsim 25.4 (5sigma ), and I=24.2 (5sigma ). 3.25 deg(2) were imaged in 6/97 using the Big Throughput Camera (BTC) on the CTIO 4-m, and a further 5 deg(2) should be observed in 1998. This survey will enable quasar selection to R=23.5, equivalent to M_B=--23 at z=3.3-4 and M_B=--23.5 at z=4-5. We expect to find 130-250 z=3.3-4 and 15-45 z=4-5 quasars in the survey, enough to define the shape of the quasar luminosity function (QLF) from --26.53.3 and to determine its evolution from z=3-5 with accuracy equal to current knowledge for M_B<--26.5. Quantifying the QLF faint-end slope and its evolution from z=3.3--5 will put strong constraints on massive galaxy formation models and on the quasar contribution to the UV and x-ray backgrounds. Also, faint quasar surveys are necessary complements to bright surveys to enable separation of redshift and luminosity dependences in quasar spectral properties. This survey will provide a sample of faint high-z quasars suitable for such studies, as well as studies of large-scale structure, intervening absorption, and quasar host galaxies at z>3.3. Spectroscopic followup will hopefully begin in 1998. We discuss basic reduction procedures for BTC data (see also Fischer, abstract #83.11, this meeting). For object detection, classification, and photometry we use SKICAT (Weir et al. 1995 [PASP 107, 1243]), which utilizes FOCAS but was specially developed for the digitized POSS to handle large imaging databases. Flattened B and I images obtained by us, and R images obtained by Bernstein et. al. and used for this project, are being made public within 6 months of observations (3.25 deg(2) at this meeting) and FOCAS catalogs within 12 months, as long as neither are used for quasar searches or weak lensing studies.

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