About the list of deep fields

This collection is put together for use within the MUSE consortium, but it might have more general interest so I have made it available publicly. It is not complete, and that I am aware of and feel free to send me additions and updates to what is here (jarle with a suffix at strw.leidenuniv.nl). Below I will explain the format used for the fields.

The data format used

The list could be kept in an MySQL database for instance, but given the limited amount of data, and for convenience the data are kept in small text files and parsed by a set of Perl routines that also produce the HTML files. The format for one entry is exemplied by the following skeleton:

Full Name: 
Name:
MultiEntry: 
Public: 
Ra:    
Dec:   
Telescope: 
Size: 
Seeing: 
Filter: 
Passband Center (ang): 
Passband Width (ang): 
5sigma Depth (AB): 
Collection: 
Comment: 
Relevant Links:
   
Publications:
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After the colon information should be provided as:

Full Name

A full identification of this set of observations. There are no formal requirements for this entry but it is easiest for debugging purposes if it is unique.

Name

A short name for the observations

MultiEntry

A logical, value Y or N (if it is not present it is implicitly assumed to be N). This indicates whether the entries below include multiple filters/areas/depths etc. If this is the case multiple entries will be made internally, one for each filter etc. - this is mostly intended as making entry of data more efficient.

Public

Whether the dataset is public or not, typical values are Y for yes, N for no, ? for unknown and A to indicate that it is available through on-line archives.

Ra & Dec

The central coordinate of the field in J2000 coordinates.

Telescope

What telescope the data were obtained from.

Size

The size (area) of the field. This can be entered in fairly free form. 100 square arcmin can be entered as 10'x10', 100 arcmin^2, 100 sq arcmin as well as similar forms involving degrees (deg) or arcseconds (''). Multiple entries are separated by commas.

Seeing

The width of the typical PSF - for some data this might be very variable in which case [variable] can be added after the value. Multiple entries are separated by commas.

Filter

The names of the filters used. If the exact ID is known then that is best, but normally that is not the case when the information is from the literature. Multiple entries are separated by commas here too.

Passband Center (<UNITS>)

This provides the central wavelength or frequency of the filter listed. The units here can be "ang" for Ångstrom, "mu" for microns, "nm" for nanometers, "keV" or THz, GHz, MHz. The conversion is made internally in the Perl routines. In general if available the pivot wavelength is used as defined in e.g. the WPPC-2 instrument handbook. Multiple entries are separated by commas here too.

Passband Width (<UNITS>)

This provides the full width half maximum (FWHM) of the filter function. This can be provided in the same units as for the passband center and is converted internally.

5sigma depth (<UNITS>)

This gives the 5σ depth for the image in a given filter. This is a bit loosely defined, but typically it means 5 times the rms noise or for point source ignoring confusion. It can be provided in AB magnitudes (AB), Jansky (Jy) or erg/s/cm^2 for X-ray data

Collection

Many datasets are used in different kinds of collections. Ie. the Hubble Ultra Deep Field is part of the Chandra Deep Field South so it is a member of both the UDF and CDF-S collections. Basically this entry provides links between surveys and should ideally be done automatically but for now it must be updated manually. Multiple entries are separated by commas.

Comment

Any kind of comment one might find relevant.

Relevant Links & Publications

These are lists of publications of relevance or links that are useful. See example below.

An example of this for a real survey is the FORS Deep Field, as follows:

Full Name: FORS Deep field
Name: FDF
MultiEntry: Y
Public: A
Ra:    01:06:03.50
Dec:   -25:45:46.00
Telescope: VLT
Size: 7'x7'
Seeing: 0.97, 0.60, 0.87, 0.75, 0.53, 1.2, 1.24, 0.78, 0.78, 0.78
Filter: U,B,g,R,I,J,Ks, NB810, NB815, NB823
Passband Center (ang): 3620, 4290, 5060, 6550, 7680, 12470, 21620, 8100, 8150, 8230
Passband Width (ang): 290, 880, 795, 1650, 1380, 2900, 2750, 69, 53, 55
5sigma Depth (AB): 24.94, 27.53, 26.85, 26.74, 26.68, 22.68, 19.72, 25.56, 25.63, 25.67
Collection: FDF
Comment: Contains QSO Q0103-260
Relevant Links:
   http://www.lsw.uni-heidelberg.de/users/jheidt/fdf/fdf.html
Publications:
   * Heidt et al (2003): 
   * Tapken et al (2006)
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