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SWIRE: The SIRTF Wide-Area Infrared Extragalactic Survey

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posted on 2023-06-08, 08:06 authored by Carol J Lonsdale, Harding E Smith, Michael Rowan-Robinson, Jason Surace, David Shupe, Cong Xu, Seb OliverSeb Oliver, Deborah Padgett, Fan Fang, Tim Conrow, Alberto Franceschini, Nick Gautier, Matt Griffin, Perry Hacking, Frank Masci, Glenn Morrison, Joanne O’Linger, Frazer Owen, Ismael Pérez-Fournon, Marguerite Pierre, Rick Puetter, Gordon Stacey, Sandra Castro, Maria Del Carmen Polletta, Duncan Farrah, Tom Jarrett, Dave Frayer, Brian Siana, Tom Babbedge, Simon Dye, Matt Fox, Eduardo Gonzalez-Solares, Malcolm Salaman, Stefano Berta, Jim J Condon, Hervé Dole, Steve Serjeant
The SIRTF Wide-Area Infrared Extragalactic Survey (SWIRE), the largest SIRTF Legacy program, is a wide-area imaging survey to trace the evolution of dusty, star-forming galaxies, evolved stellar populations, and active galactic nuclei (AGNs) as a function of environment, from redshifts to the current z ~ 3 epoch. SWIRE will survey seven high-latitude fields, totaling 60–65 deg2 in all seven SIRTF bands: Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) 3.6, 4.5, 5.6, and 8 mm and Multiband Imaging Photometer for SIRTF (MIPS) 24, 70, and 160 mm. Extensive modeling suggests that the Legacy Extragalactic Catalog may contain in excess of 2 million IR-selected galaxies, dominated by (1) ~150,000 luminous infrared galaxies (LIRGs; LFIR 1 1011 L,) detected by MIPS (and significantly more detected by IRAC), ~7000 of these with ; (2) 1 million IRAC- z 1 2 detected early-type galaxies (~ with and ~10,000 with ); and (3) ~20,000 classical AGNs 5 2 # 10 z 1 1 z 1 2 detected with MIPS, plus significantly more dust-obscured quasi-stellar objects/AGNs among the LIRGs. SWIRE will provide an unprecedented view of the evolution of galaxies, structure, and AGNs. The key scientific goals of SWIRE are (1) to determine the evolution of actively star forming and passively evolving galaxies in order to understand the history of galaxy formation in the context of cosmic structure formation; (2) to determine the evolution of the spatial distribution and clustering of evolved galaxies, starbursts, and AGNs in the key redshift range over which much of cosmic evolution has occurred; and (3) to 0.5 ! z ! 3 determine the evolutionary relationship between “normal galaxies” and AGNs and the contribution of AGN accretion energy versus stellar nucleosynthesis to the cosmic backgrounds. The large area of SWIRE is important to establish statistically significant population samples over enough volume cells that we can resolve the star formation history as a function of epoch and environment, i.e., in the context of structure formation. The large volume is also optimized for finding rare objects. The SWIRE fields are likely to become the next generation of large “cosmic windows” into the extragalactic sky. They have been uniquely selected to minimize Galactic cirrus emission over large scales. The Galaxy Evolution Explorer will observe them as part of its deep 100 deg2 survey, as will Herschel. SWIRE includes ~9 deg2 of the unique large-area XMM Large Scale Structure hard X-ray imaging survey and is partly covered by the UKIDSS deep J and K survey. An extensive optical/near-IR imaging program is underway from the ground. The SWIRE data are nonproprietary; catalogs and images will be released twice yearly, beginning about 11 months after SIRTF launch. Details of the data products and release schedule are presented.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Accepted version

Journal

Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific

ISSN

0004-6280

Publisher

IOP Publishing

Issue

810

Volume

115

Page range

897-927

Pages

31.0

Department affiliated with

  • Physics and Astronomy Publications

Notes

The prime reference for SWIRE is chosen to represent my role in this, the largest Legacy program from NASAs Spitzer mission. I was one of three UK Co-Is and was responsible for the field selection and large-scale-structure case. These fields are now the prime survey fields of that size.

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2012-02-06

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2018-08-06

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2018-08-06

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