J. Brinkman

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey Photometric Camera

We have constructed a large-format mosaic CCD camera for the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The camera consists of two arrays, a photometric array that uses 30 2048 × 2048 SITe/Tektronix CCDs (24 μm pixels) with an effective imaging area of 720 cm2 and an astrometric array that uses 24 400 × 2048 CCDs with the same pixel size, which will allow us to tie bright astrometric standard stars to the objects imaged in the photometric camera. The instrument will be used to carry out photometry essentially simultaneously in five color bands spanning the range accessible to silicon detectors on the ground in the time-delay–and–integrate (TDI) scanning mode. The photometric detectors are arrayed in the focal plane in six columns of five chips each such that two scans cover a filled stripe 25 wide. This paper presents engineering and technical details of the camera.

Analysis of systematic effects and statistical uncertainties in angular clustering of galaxies from early sloan digital sky survey data

The angular distribution of galaxies encodes a wealth of information about large-scale structure. Ultimately, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) will record the angular positions of order of 108 galaxies in five bands, adding significantly to the cosmological constraints. This is the first in a series of papers analyzing a rectangular stripe of 25 × 90° from early SDSS data. We present the angular correlation function for galaxies in four separate magnitude bins on angular scales ranging from 0003 to 15°. Much of the focus of this paper is on potential systematic effects. We show that the final galaxy catalog—with the mask accounting for regions of poor seeing, reddening, bright stars, etc.—is free from external and internal systematic effects for galaxies brighter than r* = 22. Our estimator of the angular correlation function includes the effects of the integral constraint and the mask. The full covariance matrix of errors in these estimates is derived using mock catalogs with further estimates using a number of other methods.

CLUSTERING OF SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY III PHOTOMETRIC LUMINOUS GALAXIES: THE MEASUREMENT, SYSTEMATICS, AND COSMOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) surveyed 14,555 deg2, and delivered over a trillion pixels of imaging data. We present a study of galaxy clustering using 900,000 luminous galaxies with photometric redshifts, spanning between z = 0.45 and z = 0.65, constructed from the SDSS using methods described in Ross et al. This data set spans 11,000 deg2 and probes a volume of 3 h –3 Gpc3, making it the largest volume ever used for galaxy clustering measurements. We describe in detail the construction of the survey window function and various systematics affecting our measurement. With such a large volume, high-precision cosmological constraints can be obtained given careful control and understanding of the observational systematics. We present a novel treatment of the observational systematics and its applications to the clustering signals from the data set. In this paper, we measure the angular clustering using an optimal quadratic estimator at four redshift slices with an accuracy of ~15%, with a bin size of δ l = 10 on scales of the baryon acoustic oscillations (BAOs; at l ~ 40-400). We also apply corrections to the power spectra due to systematics and derive cosmological constraints using the full shape of the power spectra. For a flat ΛCDM model, when combined with cosmic microwave background Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe 7 (WMAP7) and H 0 constraints from using 600 Cepheids observed by Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3; HST), we find ΩΛ = 0.73 ± 0.019 and H 0 to be 70.5 ± 1.6 s–1 Mpc–1 km. For an open ΛCDM model, when combined with WMAP7 + HST, we find Ω K = 0.0035 ± 0.0054, improved over WMAP7+HST alone by 40%. For a wCDM model, when combined with WMAP7+HST+SN, we find w = –1.071 ± 0.078, and H 0 to be 71.3 ± 1.7 s–1 Mpc–1 km, which is competitive with the latest large-scale structure constraints from large spectroscopic surveys such as the SDSS Data Release 7 (DR7) and WiggleZ. We also find that systematic-corrected power spectra give consistent constraints on cosmological models when compared with pre-systematic correction power spectra in the angular scales of interest. The SDSS-III Data Release 8 (SDSS-III DR8) Angular Clustering Data allow a wide range of investigations into the cosmological model, cosmic expansion (via BAO), Gaussianity of initial conditions, and neutrino masses. Here, we refer to our companion papers for further investigations using the clustering data. Our calculation of the survey selection function, systematics maps, and likelihood function for the COSMOMC package will be released at http://portal.nersc.gov/project/boss/galaxy/photoz/.

The Three-dimensional Power Spectrum from Angular Clustering of Galaxies in Early Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data

Early photometric data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) contain angular positions for 1.5 million galaxies. In companion papers, the angular correlation function w(θ) and two-dimensional power spectrum Cl of these galaxies are presented. Here we invert Limbers equation to extract the three-dimensional power spectrum from the angular results. We accomplish this using an estimate of dn/dz, the redshift distribution of galaxies in four different magnitude slices in the SDSS photometric catalog. The resulting three-dimensional power spectrum estimates from w(θ) and Cl agree with each other and with previous estimates over a range in wavenumbers 0.03 < k/(h Mpc-1) < 1. The galaxies in the faintest magnitude bin (21 < r* < 22, which have median redshift zm = 0.43) are less clustered than the galaxies in the brightest magnitude bin (18 < r* < 19 with zm = 0.17), especially on scales where nonlinearities are important. The derived power spectrum agrees with that of Szalay et al., who go directly from the raw data to a parametric estimate of the power spectrum. The strongest constraints on the shape parameter Γ come from the faintest galaxies (in the magnitude bin 21 < r* < 22), from which we infer Γ = 0.14 (95% CL).Early photometric data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) contain angular positions for 1.5 million galaxies. In companion papers, the angular correlation function w(�) and 2D power spectrum Cl of these galaxies are presented. Here we invert Limber’s equation to extract the 3D power spectrum from the angular results. We accomplish this using an estimate of dn/dz, the redshift distribution of galaxies in four different magnitude slices in the SDSS photometric catalog. The resulting 3D power spectrum estimates from w(�) and Cl agree with each other and with previous estimates over a range in wavenumbers 0.03 < k/h Mpc −1 < 1. The galaxies in the faintest magnitude bin (21 < r ∗ < 22, which have median redshift zm = 0.43) are less clustered than the galaxies in the brightest magnitude bin (18 < r ∗ < 19 with zm = 0.17), especially on scales where nonlinearities are important. The derived power spectrum agrees with that of Szalay et al. (2001) who go directly from the raw data to a parametric estimate of the power spectrum. The strongest constraints on the shape parameter come from the faintest galaxies (in the magnitude bin 21 < r ∗ < 22), from which we infer = 0 .14 +0.11 −0.06 (95% C.L.).

The three-dimensional power spectrum from angular clustering of galaxies in early SDSS data

Early photometric data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) contain angular positions for 1.5 million galaxies. In companion papers, the angular correlation function w(θ) and two-dimensional power spectrum Cl of these galaxies are presented. Here we invert Limbers equation to extract the three-dimensional power spectrum from the angular results. We accomplish this using an estimate of dn/dz, the redshift distribution of galaxies in four different magnitude slices in the SDSS photometric catalog. The resulting three-dimensional power spectrum estimates from w(θ) and Cl agree with each other and with previous estimates over a range in wavenumbers 0.03 < k/(h Mpc-1) < 1. The galaxies in the faintest magnitude bin (21 < r* < 22, which have median redshift zm = 0.43) are less clustered than the galaxies in the brightest magnitude bin (18 < r* < 19 with zm = 0.17), especially on scales where nonlinearities are important. The derived power spectrum agrees with that of Szalay et al., who go directly from the raw data to a parametric estimate of the power spectrum. The strongest constraints on the shape parameter Γ come from the faintest galaxies (in the magnitude bin 21 < r* < 22), from which we infer Γ = 0.14 (95% CL).Early photometric data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) contain angular positions for 1.5 million galaxies. In companion papers, the angular correlation function w(�) and 2D power spectrum Cl of these galaxies are presented. Here we invert Limber’s equation to extract the 3D power spectrum from the angular results. We accomplish this using an estimate of dn/dz, the redshift distribution of galaxies in four different magnitude slices in the SDSS photometric catalog. The resulting 3D power spectrum estimates from w(�) and Cl agree with each other and with previous estimates over a range in wavenumbers 0.03 < k/h Mpc −1 < 1. The galaxies in the faintest magnitude bin (21 < r ∗ < 22, which have median redshift zm = 0.43) are less clustered than the galaxies in the brightest magnitude bin (18 < r ∗ < 19 with zm = 0.17), especially on scales where nonlinearities are important. The derived power spectrum agrees with that of Szalay et al. (2001) who go directly from the raw data to a parametric estimate of the power spectrum. The strongest constraints on the shape parameter come from the faintest galaxies (in the magnitude bin 21 < r ∗ < 22), from which we infer = 0 .14 +0.11 −0.06 (95% C.L.).

Sloan Digital Sky Survey Catalog of Stars in the Draco Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) has scanned the entire region containing the Draco dwarf spheroidal galaxy to 23 mag in g*. We present a catalog of stars found in a 453 arcmin2, elliptical region centered on the Draco dwarf spheroidal galaxy. Objects in the catalog are matched with five previously published catalogs. The catalog contains SDSS photometry for 5634 individual objects, and also the photometry from matches to any of the other catalogs. A comparison of the photometry between catalogs allows us to identify 142 candidate variable objects. One hundred and twelve of the suspected variables have colors consistent with RR Lyrae variables.

SDSS-IV MaNGA: probing the kinematic morphology–density relation of early-type galaxies with MaNGA

The “kinematic” morphology–density relation for early-type galaxies posits that those galaxies with low angular momentum are preferentially found in the highest-density regions of the universe. We use a large sample of galaxy groups with halo masses 1012.5 < Mhalo< 1014.5 h -1 M observed with the Mapping Nearby Galaxies at APO (MaNGA) survey to examine whether there is a correlation between local environment and rotational support that is independent of stellar mass. We find no compelling evidence for a relationship between the angular momentum content of early-type galaxies and either local overdensity or radial position within the group at fixed stellar mass.