THE 2012 HUBBLE ULTRA DEEP FIELD (UDF12): OBSERVATIONAL OVERVIEW

Journal Article · Fri Nov 01 00:00:00 EDT 2013 · Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/0067-0049/209/1/3· OSTI ID:22273290

Koekemoer, Anton M. ^[1]; Ellis, Richard S.; Schenker, Matthew A. ^[2]; McLure, Ross J.; Dunlop, James S.; Bowler, Rebecca A. A.; Rogers, Alexander B.; Curtis-Lake, Emma; Cirasuolo, Michele; Wild, V.; Targett, T. ^[3]; Robertson, Brant E.; Schneider, Evan; Stark, Daniel P. ^[4]; Ono, Yoshiaki; Ouchi, Masami ^[5]; Charlot, Stephane ^[6]; Furlanetto, Steven R. ^[7]

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1. Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218 (United States)
2. Department of Astrophysics, California Institute of Technology, MS 249-17, Pasadena, CA 91125 (United States)
3. Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Royal Observatory, Edinburgh EH9 3HJ (United Kingdom)
4. Department of Astronomy and Steward Observatory, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721 (United States)
5. Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, University of Tokyo, Kashiwa City, Chiba 277-8582 (Japan)
6. UPMC-CNRS, UMR7095, Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris, F-75014, Paris (France)
7. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095 (United States)

We present the 2012 Hubble Ultra Deep Field campaign (UDF12), a large 128 orbit Cycle 19 Hubble Space Telescope program aimed at extending previous Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3)/IR observations of the UDF by quadrupling the exposure time in the F105W filter, imaging in an additional F140W filter, and extending the F160W exposure time by 50%, as well as adding an extremely deep parallel field with the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) in the F814W filter with a total exposure time of 128 orbits. The principal scientific goal of this project is to determine whether galaxies reionized the universe; our observations are designed to provide a robust determination of the star formation density at z ∼> 8, improve measurements of the ultraviolet continuum slope at z ∼ 7-8, facilitate the construction of new samples of z ∼ 9-10 candidates, and enable the detection of sources up to z ∼ 12. For this project we committed to combining these and other WFC3/IR imaging observations of the UDF area into a single homogeneous dataset to provide the deepest near-infrared observations of the sky. In this paper we present the observational overview of the project and describe the procedures used in reducing the data as well as the final products that were produced. We present the details of several special procedures that we implemented to correct calibration issues in the data for both the WFC3/IR observations of the main UDF field and our deep 128 orbit ACS/WFC F814W parallel field image, including treatment for persistence, correction for time-variable sky backgrounds, and astrometric alignment to an accuracy of a few milliarcseconds. We release the full, combined mosaics comprising a single, unified set of mosaics of the UDF, providing the deepest near-infrared blank-field view of the universe currently achievable, reaching magnitudes as deep as AB ∼ 30 mag in the near-infrared, and yielding a legacy dataset on this field.

• OSTI ID: 22273290
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series, Vol. 209, Issue 1; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0067-0049
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
ACCURACY
ASTRONOMY
ASTROPHYSICS
CALIBRATION
CAMERAS
CORRECTIONS
COSMOLOGY
FILTERS
GALAXIES
RED SHIFT
STARS
TELESCOPES
ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION
UNIVERSE