We simulate galaxy properties and redshift estimation for SPHEREx, the next NASA Medium Class Explorer. To make robust models of the galaxy population and test the spectrophotometric redshift performance for SPHEREx, we develop a set of synthetic spectral energy distributions based on detailed fits to COSMOS2020 photometry spanning 0.1–8 μm. Given that SPHEREx obtains low-resolution spectra, emission lines will be important for some fraction of galaxies. Here, we expand on previous work, using better photometry and photometric redshifts from COSMOS2020 and tight empirical relations to predict robust emission-line strengths and ratios. A second galaxy catalog derived from the GAMA survey is generated to ensure the bright (mAB < 18 in the i band) sample is representative over larger areas. Using template fitting to estimate photometric continuum redshifts, we forecast the recovery of 19 million galaxies over 30,000 deg2 with redshifts better than σz < 0.003(1 + z), 445 million with σz < 0.1(1 + z), and 810 million with σz < 0.2(1 + z). We also find through idealized tests that emission-line information from spectrally dithered flux measurements can yield redshifts with accuracy beyond that implied by the naive SPHEREx channel resolution, motivating the development of a hybrid continuum–line redshift estimation approach.
The Universe SPHEREx Will See: Empirically Based Galaxy Simulations and Redshift Predictions
Abstract
Copyright and License
© 2024. The Author(s). Published by the American Astronomical Society.
Original content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.
Acknowledgement
Part of this work was done at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. We also acknowledge support from the SPHEREx project under a contract from the NASA/GODDARD Space Flight Center to the California Institute of Technology. We thank Sylvain de la Torre for providing crossmatched versions of the zCOSMOS/3D-HST catalogs with our synthetic catalog for direct source comparison. We also thank Sean Bryan and the SPHEREx survey team for providing the deep-field coverage maps shown in this work. We thank the anonymous referee for constructive feedback that improved the quality of this manuscript. More information on the COSMOS survey is available at https://cosmos.astro.caltech.edu. GAMA is a joint European–Australasian project based around a spectroscopic campaign using the Anglo-Australian Telescope. The GAMA input catalog is based on data taken from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey. Complementary imaging of the GAMA regions is being obtained by a number of independent survey programmes, including GALEX MIS, VST KiDS, VISTA VIKING, WISE, HerschelATLAS, GMRT, and ASKAP. providing UV to radio coverage. GAMA is funded by the STFC (UK), the ARC (Australia), the AAO, and the participating institutions. The GAMA website is http://www.gama-survey.org/.
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Additional details
- California Institute of Technology
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Accepted
-
2024-06-14Accepted
- Available
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2024-08-26Published
- Caltech groups
- Astronomy Department, Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC)
- Publication Status
- Published