2008/02/05 by Daniel A. Dale, Rebecca J. Barlow, S. Cohen +8
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics #COSMIC cancer database #Cosmic variance #Extinction (optical mineralogy) #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Galaxy #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Luminosity #Luminosity function #Physics #Redshift #Star formation #Telescope #Universe #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/0004-6256/135/4/1412
To appear in the Astronomical Journal
arxiv created 2008/02/05 · openalex publication_date 2008/03/10 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
The Wyoming Survey for Hα, or WySH, is a large-area, ground-based, narrowband imaging survey for Hα-emitting galaxies over the latter half of the age of the universe. The survey spans several square degrees in a set of fields of low Galactic cirrus emission. The observing program focuses on multiple Δ z ∼ 0.02 epochs from z ∼ 0.16 to z ∼ 0.81 down to a uniform (continuum+line) luminosity at each epoch of ∼10 33 W uncorrected for extinction (3σ for a 3'' diameter aperture). First results are presented here for 98+208 galaxies observed over approximately 2 deg 2 at redshifts z ∼ 0.16 and 0.24, including preliminary luminosity functions at these two epochs. These data clearly show an evolution with lookback time in the volume-averaged cosmic star-formation rate. Integrals of Schechter fits to the extinction-corrected Hα luminosity functions indicate star-formation rates per co-moving volume of 0.009 and 0.014 h 70 M ☉ yr −1 Mpc −3 at z ∼ 0.16 and 0.24, respectively. The formal uncertainties in the Schechter fits, based on this initial subset of the survey, correspond to uncertainties in the cosmic star formation rate density at the ≳40% level; the tentative uncertainty due to cosmic variance is 25%, estimated from separately carrying out the analysis on data from the first two fields with substantial datasets.