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Journal ArticleDOI

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Technical summary

Donald G. York1, Jennifer Adelman2, John E. Anderson2, Scott F. Anderson3  +148 moreInstitutions (29)
01 Sep 2000-The Astronomical Journal (IOP Publishing Ltd.)-Vol. 120, Iss: 3, pp 1579-1587
TL;DR: The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) as discussed by the authors provides the data to support detailed investigations of the distribution of luminous and non-luminous matter in the universe: a photometrically and astrometrically calibrated digital imaging survey of π sr above about Galactic latitude 30° in five broad optical bands to a depth of g' ~ 23 mag.
Abstract: The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) will provide the data to support detailed investigations of the distribution of luminous and nonluminous matter in the universe: a photometrically and astrometrically calibrated digital imaging survey of π sr above about Galactic latitude 30° in five broad optical bands to a depth of g' ~ 23 mag, and a spectroscopic survey of the approximately 106 brightest galaxies and 105 brightest quasars found in the photometric object catalog produced by the imaging survey. This paper summarizes the observational parameters and data products of the SDSS and serves as an introduction to extensive technical on-line documentation.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) as mentioned in this paper collected 25.4 Tbytes of raw imaging data from two dedicated 1.3 m diameter telescopes located at Mount Hopkins, Arizona and CerroTololo, Chile.
Abstract: Between 1997 June and 2001 February the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) collected 25.4 Tbytes of raw imagingdatacovering99.998%ofthecelestialsphereinthenear-infraredJ(1.25 � m),H(1.65 � m),andKs(2.16 � m) bandpasses. Observations were conducted from two dedicated 1.3 m diameter telescopes located at Mount Hopkins, Arizona,andCerroTololo,Chile.The7.8sofintegrationtimeaccumulatedforeachpointontheskyandstrictquality control yielded a 10 � point-source detection level of better than 15.8, 15.1, and 14.3 mag at the J, H, and Ks bands, respectively, for virtually the entire sky. Bright source extractions have 1 � photometric uncertainty of <0.03 mag and astrometric accuracy of order 100 mas. Calibration offsets between any two points in the sky are <0.02 mag. The 2MASS All-Sky Data Release includes 4.1 million compressed FITS images covering the entire sky, 471 million source extractions in a Point Source Catalog, and 1.6 million objects identified as extended in an Extended Source Catalog.

12,126 citations


Cites background from "The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Techn..."

  • ...An ideal survey instrument contains a large number of large-format arrays for each wavelength band (e.g., Sloan Digital Sky Survey [SDSS]; York et al. 2000)....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the spectral evolution of stellar populations at ages between 100,000 yr and 20 Gyr at a resolution of 3 A across the whole wavelength range from 3200 to 9500 A for a wide range of metallicities.
Abstract: We present a new model for computing the spectral evolution of stellar populations at ages between 100,000 yr and 20 Gyr at a resolution of 3 A across the whole wavelength range from 3200 to 9500 A for a wide range of metallicities. These predictions are based on a newly available library of observed stellar spectra. We also compute the spectral evolution across a larger wavelength range, from 91 A to 160 micron, at lower resolution. The model incorporates recent progress in stellar evolution theory and an observationally motivated prescription for thermally-pulsing stars on the asymptotic giant branch. The latter is supported by observations of surface brightness fluctuations in nearby stellar populations. We show that this model reproduces well the observed optical and near-infrared colour-magnitude diagrams of Galactic star clusters of various ages and metallicities. Stochastic fluctuations in the numbers of stars in different evolutionary phases can account for the full range of observed integrated colours of star clusters in the Magellanic Clouds. The model reproduces in detail typical galaxy spectra from the Early Data Release (EDR) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). We exemplify how this type of spectral fit can constrain physical parameters such as the star formation history, metallicity and dust content of galaxies. Our model is the first to enable accurate studies of absorption-line strengths in galaxies containing stars over the full range of ages. Using the highest-quality spectra of the SDSS EDR, we show that this model can reproduce simultaneously the observed strengths of those Lick indices that do not depend strongly on element abundance ratios [abridged].

10,384 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Dec 2010
TL;DR: The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) is mapping the whole sky following its launch on 14 December 2009 and completed its first full coverage of the sky on July 17 as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The all sky surveys done by the Palomar Observatory Schmidt, the European Southern Observatory Schmidt, and the United Kingdom Schmidt, the InfraRed Astronomical Satellite and the 2 Micron All Sky Survey have proven to be extremely useful tools for astronomy with value that lasts for decades. The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer is mapping the whole sky following its launch on 14 December 2009. WISE began surveying the sky on 14 Jan 2010 and completed its first full coverage of the sky on July 17. The survey will continue to cover the sky a second time until the cryogen is exhausted (anticipated in November 2010). WISE is achieving 5 sigma point source sensitivities better than 0.08, 0.11, 1 and 6 mJy in unconfused regions on the ecliptic in bands centered at wavelengths of 3.4, 4.6, 12 and 22 micrometers. Sensitivity improves toward the ecliptic poles due to denser coverage and lower zodiacal background. The angular resolution is 6.1", 6.4", 6.5" and 12.0" at 3.4, 4.6, 12 and 22 micrometers, and the astrometric precision for high SNR sources is better than 0.15".

7,182 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors measured the difference between the measured and predicted colors of a star, as derived from stellar parameters from the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration Stellar Parameter Pipeline, and achieved uncertainties of 56, 34, 25, and 29 mmag in the colors u − g, g − r, r − i, and i − z, per star.
Abstract: We present measurements of dust reddening using the colors of stars with spectra in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. We measure reddening as the difference between the measured and predicted colors of a star, as derived from stellar parameters from the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration Stellar Parameter Pipeline. We achieve uncertainties of 56, 34, 25, and 29 mmag in the colors u – g, g – r, r – i, and i – z, per star, though the uncertainty varies depending on the stellar type and the magnitude of the star. The spectrum-based reddening measurements confirm our earlier "blue tip" reddening measurements, finding reddening coefficients different by –3%, 1%, 1%, and 2% in u – g, g – r, r – i, and i – z from those found by the blue tip method, after removing a 4% normalization difference. These results prefer an RV = 3.1 Fitzpatrick reddening law to O'Donnell or Cardelli et al. reddening laws. We provide a table of conversion coefficients from the Schlegel et al. (SFD) maps of E(B – V) to extinction in 88 bandpasses for four values of RV , using this reddening law and the 14% recalibration of SFD first reported by Schlafly et al. and confirmed in this work.

6,643 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A series of improvements to the spectroscopic reductions are described, including better flat fielding and improved wavelength calibration at the blue end, better processing of objects with extremely strong narrow emission lines, and an improved determination of stellar metallicities.
Abstract: This paper describes the Seventh Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), marking the completion of the original goals of the SDSS and the end of the phase known as SDSS-II. It includes 11,663 deg^2 of imaging data, with most of the ~2000 deg^2 increment over the previous data release lying in regions of low Galactic latitude. The catalog contains five-band photometry for 357 million distinct objects. The survey also includes repeat photometry on a 120° long, 2°.5 wide stripe along the celestial equator in the Southern Galactic Cap, with some regions covered by as many as 90 individual imaging runs. We include a co-addition of the best of these data, going roughly 2 mag fainter than the main survey over 250 deg^2. The survey has completed spectroscopy over 9380 deg^2; the spectroscopy is now complete over a large contiguous area of the Northern Galactic Cap, closing the gap that was present in previous data releases. There are over 1.6 million spectra in total, including 930,000 galaxies, 120,000 quasars, and 460,000 stars. The data release includes improved stellar photometry at low Galactic latitude. The astrometry has all been recalibrated with the second version of the USNO CCD Astrograph Catalog, reducing the rms statistical errors at the bright end to 45 milliarcseconds per coordinate. We further quantify a systematic error in bright galaxy photometry due to poor sky determination; this problem is less severe than previously reported for the majority of galaxies. Finally, we describe a series of improvements to the spectroscopic reductions, including better flat fielding and improved wavelength calibration at the blue end, better processing of objects with extremely strong narrow emission lines, and an improved determination of stellar metallicities.

5,665 citations

References
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, a reprocessed composite of the COBE/DIRBE and IRAS/ISSA maps, with the zodiacal foreground and confirmed point sources removed, is presented.
Abstract: We present a full-sky 100 μm map that is a reprocessed composite of the COBE/DIRBE and IRAS/ISSA maps, with the zodiacal foreground and confirmed point sources removed. Before using the ISSA maps, we remove the remaining artifacts from the IRAS scan pattern. Using the DIRBE 100 and 240 μm data, we have constructed a map of the dust temperature so that the 100 μm map may be converted to a map proportional to dust column density. The dust temperature varies from 17 to 21 K, which is modest but does modify the estimate of the dust column by a factor of 5. The result of these manipulations is a map with DIRBE quality calibration and IRAS resolution. A wealth of filamentary detail is apparent on many different scales at all Galactic latitudes. In high-latitude regions, the dust map correlates well with maps of H I emission, but deviations are coherent in the sky and are especially conspicuous in regions of saturation of H I emission toward denser clouds and of formation of H2 in molecular clouds. In contrast, high-velocity H I clouds are deficient in dust emission, as expected. To generate the full-sky dust maps, we must first remove zodiacal light contamination, as well as a possible cosmic infrared background (CIB). This is done via a regression analysis of the 100 μm DIRBE map against the Leiden-Dwingeloo map of H I emission, with corrections for the zodiacal light via a suitable expansion of the DIRBE 25 μm flux. This procedure removes virtually all traces of the zodiacal foreground. For the 100 μm map no significant CIB is detected. At longer wavelengths, where the zodiacal contamination is weaker, we detect the CIB at surprisingly high flux levels of 32 ± 13 nW m-2 sr-1 at 140 μm and of 17 ± 4 nW m-2 sr-1 at 240 μm (95% confidence). This integrated flux ~2 times that extrapolated from optical galaxies in the Hubble Deep Field. The primary use of these maps is likely to be as a new estimator of Galactic extinction. To calibrate our maps, we assume a standard reddening law and use the colors of elliptical galaxies to measure the reddening per unit flux density of 100 μm emission. We find consistent calibration using the B-R color distribution of a sample of the 106 brightest cluster ellipticals, as well as a sample of 384 ellipticals with B-V and Mg line strength measurements. For the latter sample, we use the correlation of intrinsic B-V versus Mg2 index to tighten the power of the test greatly. We demonstrate that the new maps are twice as accurate as the older Burstein-Heiles reddening estimates in regions of low and moderate reddening. The maps are expected to be significantly more accurate in regions of high reddening. These dust maps will also be useful for estimating millimeter emission that contaminates cosmic microwave background radiation experiments and for estimating soft X-ray absorption. We describe how to access our maps readily for general use.

15,988 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors presented a reprocessed composite of the COBE/DIRBE and IRAS/ISSA maps, with the zodiacal foreground and confirmed point sources removed.
Abstract: We present a full sky 100 micron map that is a reprocessed composite of the COBE/DIRBE and IRAS/ISSA maps, with the zodiacal foreground and confirmed point sources removed. Before using the ISSA maps, we remove the remaining artifacts from the IRAS scan pattern. Using the DIRBE 100 micron and 240 micron data, we have constructed a map of the dust temperature, so that the 100 micron map can be converted to a map proportional to dust column density. The result of these manipulations is a map with DIRBE-quality calibration and IRAS resolution. To generate the full sky dust maps, we must first remove zodiacal light contamination as well as a possible cosmic infrared background (CIB). This is done via a regression analysis of the 100 micron DIRBE map against the Leiden- Dwingeloo map of H_I emission, with corrections for the zodiacal light via a suitable expansion of the DIRBE 25 micron flux. For the 100 micron map, no significant CIB is detected. In the 140 micron and 240 micron maps, where the zodiacal contamination is weaker, we detect the CIB at surprisingly high flux levels of 32 \pm 13 nW/m^2/sr at 140 micron, and 17 \pm 4 nW/m^2/sr at 240 micron (95% confidence). This integrated flux is ~2 times that extrapolated from optical galaxies in the Hubble Deep Field. The primary use of these maps is likely to be as a new estimator of Galactic extinction. We demonstrate that the new maps are twice as accurate as the older Burstein-Heiles estimates in regions of low and moderate reddening. These dust maps will also be useful for estimating millimeter emission that contaminates CMBR experiments and for estimating soft X-ray absorption.

14,295 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey photometric system, a new five-color (u' g' r' i' z') wide-band CCD system with wavelength coverage from 3000 to 11 000 A.
Abstract: This paper describes the Sloan Digital Sky Survey photometric system, a new five-color (u' g' r' i' z') wide-band CCD system with wavelength coverage from 3000 to 11 000 A. The zero points will be based on an updated version of the spectrophotometric ABv system. This updated calibration, designated as AB95, is presented in this paper.

3,098 citations


"The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Techn..." refers methods in this paper

  • ...…is placed on the ABν system using three fundamental standards (BD + 17◦4708, BD + 26◦2606, and BD + 21◦609), whose magnitude scale is as defined by Fukugita et al. (1996); a set of 157 primary standards, which are calibrated by the above fundamental standards using the USNO 1m telescope, and…...

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  • ...The five filters in the imaging array of the camera, [u′, g′, r′, i′ and z′] have effective wavelengths of [3590 Å, 4810 Å, 6230 Å, 7640 Å and 9060 Å] (Fukugita et al. 1996; Gunn et al. 1998)....

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  • ...The magnitude scale is on the ABν system (Oke 1969, unpublished), which was updated to the AB79 system by Oke & Gunn (1983) and to AB95 by Fukugita et al. (1996)....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The first year of the First Radio Sky at Twenty centimeters (FIRST) survey as discussed by the authors was performed using the NRAO Very Large Array (VLA) with a total of 144 hr of time in 1993 April and May was used for a variety of tests, as well as to cover an initial strip of the survey extending between 07{sup h}15{sup m} and 16{suph}30{supm} in a 2{sq_bullet}8 wide declination zone passing through the local zenith.
Abstract: The FIRST survey to produce Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty centimeters is now underway using the NRAO Very Large Array. We describe here the scientific motivation for a large-area sky survey at radio frequencies which has a sensitivity and angular resolution comparable to the Palomar Observatory Sky Survey, and we recount the history that led to the current survey project. The technical design of the survey is covered in detail, including a description and justification of the grid pattern chosen, the rationale behind the integration time and angular resolution selected, and a summary of the other considerations which informed our planning for the project. A comprehensive description of the automated data analysis pipeline we have developed is presented. We also report here the results of the first year of FIRST observations. A total of 144 hr of time in 1993 April and May was used for a variety of tests, as well as to cover an initial strip of the survey extending between 07{sup h}15{sup m} and 16{sup h}30{sup m} in a 2{sq_bullet}8 wide declination zone passing through the local zenith (28.2{lt}{delta}{lt}31.0). A total of 2153 individual pointings yielded an image database containing 1039 merged images 46{sq_bullet}5{times}34{sq_bullet}5more » in extent with 1{center_dot}{double_prime}8 pixels and a typical rms of 0.13 mJy. A catalog derived from this 300 deg{sup 2} region contains 28,000 radio sources. We have performed extensive tests on the images and source list in order to establish the photometric and astrometric accuracy of these data products. We find systematic astrometric errors of {lt}0{center_dot}{double_prime}05; individual sources down to the 1 mJy survey flux density threshold have 90{percent} confidence error circles with radii of {lt}1{double_prime}. CLEAN bias introduces a systematic underestimate of point-source flux densities of {approximately}0.25 mJy; the bias is more severe for extended sources. (Abstract Truncated)« less

3,011 citations


"The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Techn..." refers methods in this paper

  • ...Stellar objects brighter than i′ =20 which are FIRST sources (Becker, White and Helfand 1995) are also selected....

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  • ...Comparison with positions from the FIRST (Becker et al. 1995) and 2MASS (Skrutskie 1999) catalogues shows that the rms astrometric accuracy is currently better than 150 milliarcseconds (mas) in each coordinate....

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  • ...The atlas images are sized to enclose the area occupied by each object plus the PSF width, or the object size given in the ROSAT or FIRST catalogues....

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  • ...The photometric data products of the SDSS include: a catalog of all detected objects, with measured positions, magnitudes, shape parameters, model fits and processing flags; atlas images (i.e. cutouts from the imaging data in all five bands) of all detected objects and of objects from the FIRST and ROSAT catalogs; a 4× 4 binned image of the corrected images with the objects removed: and a mask of the areas of sky not processed (because of saturated stars, for example) and of corrected pixels (e.g. those from which cosmic rays were removed)....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the absolute spectral energy distribution for the primary standard star Alpha Lyrae was adopted and absolute fluxes for the four very metal-deficient F type subdwarfs HD 19445, HD 84937, BD + 26.2606 deg, and BD + 17.4703 deg.
Abstract: Based on an adopted absolute spectral energy distribution for the primary standard star Alpha Lyrae, absolute fluxes are given for the four very metal-deficient F type subdwarfs HD 19445, HD 84937, BD + 26.2606 deg, and BD + 17.4703 deg. Somewhat inferior data are also given for HD 140283. The data are given for 40-A bands and cover the wavelength range from 3080 A to 12,000 A. The four stars, all near magnitude 9 and distributed around the sky, are intended as secondary standards for absolute spectrophotometry.

2,464 citations


"The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Techn..." refers methods in this paper

  • ...The magnitude scale is on the ABν system (Oke 1969, unpublished), which was updated to the AB79 system by Oke & Gunn (1983) and to AB95 by Fukugita et al. (1996)....

    [...]