Sherie T. Holfeltz

The GHOSTS Survey. I. Hubble Space Telescope Advanced Camera for Surveys data

We present an overview of the GHOSTS survey, the largest study to date of the resolved stellar populations in the outskirts of disk galaxies. The sample consists of 14 disk galaxies within 17 Mpc, whose outer disks and halos are imaged with the Hubble Space Telescope Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). In the first paper of this series, we describe the sample, explore the benefits of using resolved stellar populations, and discuss our ACS F606W and F814W photometry. We use artificial star tests to assess completeness and use overlapping regions to estimate photometric uncertainties. The median depth of the survey at 50% completeness is 2.7?mag below the tip of the red giant branch (TRGB). We comprehensively explore and parameterize contamination from unresolved background galaxies and foreground stars using archival fields of high-redshift ACS observations. Left uncorrected, these would account for 100.65 ? F814W ? 19.0 detections per mag per arcsec2. We therefore identify several selection criteria that typically remove 95% of the contaminants. Even with these culls, background galaxies are a significant limitation to the surface brightness detection limit which, for this survey, is typically V ~ 30?mag?arcsec?2. The resulting photometric catalogs are publicly available and contain some 3.1 million stars across 76 ACS fields, predominantly of low extinction. The uniform magnitudes of TRGB stars in these fields enable galaxy distance estimates with 2%-7% accuracy.

STELLAR POPULATIONS ACROSS THE NGC 4244 TRUNCATED GALACTIC DISK

We use HST/ACS to study the resolved stellar populations of the nearby, nearly edge-on galaxy NGC 4244 across its outer disk surface density break. The stellar photometry allows us to study the distribution of different stellar populations and reach very low equivalent surface brightnesses. We find that the break occurs at the same radius for young, intermediate age, and old stars. The stellar density beyond the break drops sharply by a factor of at least 600 in 5 kpc. The break occurs at the same radius independent of height above the disk, but is sharpest in the midplane and nearly disappears at large heights. These results make it unlikely that truncations are caused by a star formation threshold alone: the threshold would have to keep the same radial position from less than 100 Myr to 10 Gyr ago, in spite of potential disturbances such as infall and redistribution of gas by internal processes. A dynamical interpretation of truncation formation is more likely such as due to angular momentum redistribution by bars or density waves, or heating and stripping of stars caused by the bombardment of dark matter sub-halos. The latter explanation is also in quantitative agreement with the small diffuse component we see around the galaxy. Subject headings: galaxies: evolution — galaxies: halos — galaxies: individual (NGC 4244) — galaxies: spiral — galaxies: stellar content — galaxies: structure

Post-NCS Performance of the HST NICMOS

We describe the on-orbit performance of the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) following the installation of the NICMOS Cooling System (NCS). NICMOS is operated at a higher temperature (~77 K) than in the previous observing 1997-1998 period (~62 K). Due to the higher operating temperature, the detector QE is higher, while the well depth is less. The spatial structure of the flat field response remained essentially unchanged. We will show the effects of operating at the higher temperature and present current NICMOS calibration images. In addition, we present an overview of on-orbit testing and report on the re-enabling of NICMOS.

Properties of PACE‐I HgCdTe Detectors in Space: The NICMOS Warm‐Up Monitoring Program

We summarize the results of a monitoring program which was executed following the cryogen exhaustion of the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) on board the Hubble Space Telescope. During the subsequent warm-up, detector parameters such as detective quantum efficiency, dark current, bias offsets, and saturation levels have been measured over the temperature range 62 K to about 100 K. The measurements provide a unique database of the characteristics of PACE-I HgCdTe detector arrays in the space environment. A surprising result of the analysis is the fact that all three NICMOS detectors showed an enhanced dark current in the temperature range between 77 and 85 K. However, a subsequent laboratory experiment designed to replicate the on-orbit warm-up did not reproduce the anomaly, despite the fact that it employed a flight-spare detector of the same pedigree. The mechanism behind the on-orbit dark current anomaly is therefore believed to be unique to the space environment. We discuss possible explanations for these unexpected observational results, as well as their implications for future NICMOS operations.