The SAMI Galaxy Survey:cubism and covariance, putting round pegs into square holes
We present a methodology for the regularization and combination of sparse sampled and irregularly gridded observations from fibre-optic multiobject integral field spectroscopy. The approach minimizes interpolation and retains image resolution on combining subpixel dithered data. We discuss the metho...
Published in: | Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society |
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Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | English |
Published: |
2015
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Subjects: | |
Online Access: | https://researchers.mq.edu.au/en/publications/efac9b10-b540-43e4-a7d6-426e42d9e408 https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stu2055 https://research-management.mq.edu.au/ws/files/62224030/Publisher%20version.pdf http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84919688994&partnerID=8YFLogxK |
Summary: | We present a methodology for the regularization and combination of sparse sampled and irregularly gridded observations from fibre-optic multiobject integral field spectroscopy. The approach minimizes interpolation and retains image resolution on combining subpixel dithered data. We discuss the methodology in the context of the Sydney-AAO multiobject integral field spectrograph (SAMI) Galaxy Survey underway at the Anglo-Australian Telescope. The SAMI instrument uses 13 fibre bundles to perform high-multiplex integral field spectroscopy across a 1° diameter field of view. The SAMI Galaxy Survey is targeting ~3000 galaxies drawn from the full range of galaxy environments. We demonstrate the subcritical sampling of the seeing and incomplete fill factor for the integral field bundles results in only a 10 per cent degradation in the final image resolution recovered. We also implement a new methodology for tracking covariance between elements of the resulting data cubes which retains 90 per cent of the covariance information while incurring only a modest increase in the survey data volume. |
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