The THU-NAOC transient survey: the performance and results from the first year

The Tsinghua University-National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences （NAOC） Transient Survey is an automatic survey that conducts a systematic exploration of optical transients. This project utilizes a 60/90 cm Schmidt telescope at the Xinglong Station of NAOC. This survey repeatedly covers - 1000 square degrees of the northern sky with a cadence of 34 d. With an exposure of 60 s, the survey reaches a limiting unfiltered magnitude of about 19.5 mag, which enables us to discover supernovae in their relatively young stages. We describe the overall performance of our survey during the first year and present some preliminary results.

Kinematics and stellar population properties of the Andromeda galaxy by using the spectroscopic observations of the Guoshoujing Telescope

The Andromeda galaxy was observed by the Guoshoujing Telescope （formerly named the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope -- LAMOST）, during the 2009 commissioning phase. Due to the absence of standard stars for flux calibration, we use the photometric data of 15 intermediate bands in the Beijing-Arizona-Taipei-Connecticut （BATC） survey to calibrate the spectra. In to- tal, 59 spectra located in the bulge and disk of the galaxy are obtained. Kinematic and stellar population properties of the stellar content are derived with these spectra. We obtain the global velocity field and calculate corresponding rotation velocities out to about 7 kpc along the major axis. These rotation velocity measurements comple- ment those of the gas content, such as the H I and CO. The radial velocity dispersion shows that the stars in the bulge are more dynamically thermal and the disk is more rotationally-supported. The age distribution shows that the bulge was formed about 12 Gyr ago, the disk is relatively younger and the ages of some regions along the spi- ral arms can reach as young as about 1 Gyr. These young stellar populations have a relatively richer abundance and larger reddening. The overall average metallicity of the galaxy approximates the solar metallicity and a very weak abundance gradient is gained. The reddening map gives a picture of a dust-free bulge and a distinct dusty ring in the disk.

The correction of diurnal effects on CSTAR photometry

In January, 2008 the Chinese Small Telescope ARray （CSTAR） was suc-cessfully deployed at Dome A, Antarctica. Because CSTAR consists of four static14.5 cm telescopes pointing at the same 4.5° x 4.5° field around the south celestialpole, diurnal motion can be seen in its field of view. The stars are centered at differentpositions in different exposure frames. During four months of continuous observationsduring the polar night of 2008, about 0.3 million/-band images were obtained. In thelatest version of the released photometric catalog, the effects of diurnal motion of thestars on the static CSTAR optical system can be obviously found. In this work, weupdate the CSTAR catalog by carefully analyzing and correcting the systematic errorscaused by diurnal motion of stars on imperfectly flat-fielded frames.

The tidal tails of globular cluster Palomar 5 based on the neural networks method

The sixth Data Release （DR6） of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey （SDSS） provides more photometric regions, new features and more accurate data around globular cluster Palomar 5. A new method, Back Propagation Neural Network （BPNN）, is used to estimate the cluster membership probability in order to detect its tidal tails. Cluster and field stars, used for training the networks, are extracted over a 40 × 20 deg^2 field by color-magnitude diagrams （CMDs）. The best BPNNs with two hidden layers and a Levenberg-Marquardt （LM） training algorithm are determined by the chosen cluster and field samples. The membership probabilities of stars in the whole field are obtained with the BPNNs, and contour maps of the probability distribution show that a tail extends .5.42° to the north of the cluster and another tail extends 3.77° to the south. The tails are similar to those detected by Odenkirchen et al., but no more debris from the cluster is found to the northeast in the sky. The radial density profiles are investigated both along the tails and near the cluster center. Quite a few substructures are discovered in the tails. The number density profile of the cluster is fitted with the King model and the tidal radius is determined as 14.28＇. However, the King model cannot fit the observed profile at the outer regions （R 〉 8＇） because of the tidal tails generated by the tidal force. Luminosity functions of the cluster and the tidal tails are calculated, which confirm that the tails originate from Palomar 5.

Photometric Redshifts and Galaxy Clusters for DES DR2, DESI DR9, and HSC-SSP PDR3 Data

Photometric redshift(photoz)is a fundamental parameter for multi-wavelength photometric surveys,while galaxy clusters are important cosmological probes and ideal objects for exploring the dense environmental impact on galaxy evolution.We extend our previous work on estimating photoz and detecting galaxy clusters to the latest data releases of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument(DESI)imaging surveys,Dark Energy Survey(DES)and Hyper Suprime-Cam Subaru Strategic Program(HSC-SSP)imaging surveys and make corresponding catalogs publicly available for more extensive scientific applications.The photoz catalogs include accurate measurements of photoz and stellar mass for about 320,293and 134 million galaxies with r<23,i<24 and i<25 in DESI DR9,DES DR2 and HSC-SSP PDR3 data,respectively.The photoz accuracy is about 0.017,0.024 and 0.029 and the general redshift coverage is z<1,z<1.2 and z<1.6,respectively for those three surveys.The uncertainty of the logarithmic stellar mass that is inferred from stellar population synthesis fitting is about 0.2 dex.With the above photoz catalogs,galaxy clusters are detected using a fast cluster-finding algorithm.A total of 532,810,86,963 and 36,566 galaxy clusters with the number of members larger than 10 is discovered for DESI,DES and HSC-SSP,respectively.Their photoz accuracy is at the level of 0.01.The total mass of our clusters is also estimated by using the calibration relations between the optical richness and the mass measurement from X-ray and radio observations.The photoz and cluster catalogs are available at Science DB(https://www.doi.org/10.11922/sciencedb.o00069.00003)and Paper Data Repository(https://doi.org/10.12149/101089).

Spatially-resolved stellar population properties of the M51–NGC 5195 system from multi-wavelength photometric data

Using multi-band photometric images of M51 and its companion NGC 5195 from ultraviolet to optical and infrared,we investigate spatially resolved stellar population properties of this interacting system with stellar population synthesis models.The observed infrared excess(IRX)is used to constrain dust extinction.Stellar mass is also inferred from the model fitting.By fitting observed spectral energy distributions(SEDs)with synthetical ones,we derive two-dimensional distributions of stellar age,metallicity,dust extinction and stellar mass.In M51,two grand-designed spiral arms extending from the bulge show young age,rich metallicity and abundant dust.The inter-arm regions are filled with older,metalpoorer and less dusty stellar populations.Except for the spiral arm extending from M51 into NGC 5195,the stellar population properties of NGC 5195 are quite featureless.NGC 5195 is much older than M51,and its core is very dusty with AV up to 1.67 mag and dense in stellar mass surface density.The close encounters might drive the dust in the spiral arm of M51 into the center of NGC 5195.

South Galactic Cap u-band Sky Survey(SCUSS):Project Overview

The South Galactic Cap u-band Sky Survey （SCUSS） was established in 2009 in order to provide a photometric input catalog for target selection of the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope （LAMOST） project. SCUSS is an international cooperative project between National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Steward Observatory at the University of Arizona, using the 90 inch （2.3 m） Bok telescope on Kitt Peak. The telescope is equipped with a prime focus camera that is composed of a mosaic of four 4096 × 4096 CCDs and has a field of view of about 1 deg2. From 2009 to 2013, SCUSS performed a sky survey of an approximately 5000 deg2 field of the South Galactic Cap in u band, including the Galactic anticenter area and the SDSS-IV extended imaging area. The limiting magnitude of SCUSS is deeper than 23 mag （at a signal-to-noise ratio of 5）. In this paper, we briefly describe the goals of this project, method of observations and data reduction, and we also introduce current and potential scientific activities related to the SCUSS project.

Metal abundance and kinematical properties of the M81 globular cluster system

We present metal abundance properties of 144 globular clusters associated with M81. These globulars represent the largest globular cluster sample in M81 till now. Our main results are： the distribution of metallicities is bimodal, with metallicity peaks at [Fe/H] -1.51 and -0.58, and the metal-poor globular clusters tend to be less spatially concentrated than the metal-rich ones; the metal-rich globular clusters in M81 do not demonstrate a centrally concentrated spatial distribution like the metalrich ones in M31 do; like our Galaxy and M31, the globular clusters in M81 have a small radial metallicity gradient. These results are consistent with those obtained from a small sample of M81 globular clusters. In addition, this paper shows that there is evidence that a strong rotation of the M81 globular cluster system around the minor axis exists, and that rotation is present in the metal-rich globular cluster subsample, but the metal-poor globular cluster subsample shows no evidence of rotation. The most significant difference between the rotation of the metal-rich and metal-poor globular clusters occurs at intermediate projected galactocentric radii. Our results confirm the conclusion of Schroder et al. that M81＇s metal-rich globular clusters at intermediate projected radii are associated with a thick disk of M81.

Multicolor photometry of the nearby galaxy cluster A119

This paper presents multicolor optical photometry of the nearby galaxy cluster Abell 119 （z = 0.0442） with the Beijing-Arizona-Taiwan-Connecticut system of 15 intermediate bands. Within the BATC field of view of 58＇× 58＇, there are 368 galaxies with known spectroscopic redshifts, including 238 member galaxies （called sample I）. Based on the spectral energy distributions of 1376 galaxies brighter than iBATC ---- 19.5, the photometric redshift technique and the color-magnitude relation of early-type galaxies are applied to select faint member galaxies. As a result, 117 faint galaxies were selected as new member galaxies. Combined with sample I, an enlarged sample （called sample II） of 355 member galaxies is obtained. Spatial distribution and localized velocity structure for two samples demonstrate that A119 is a dynami- cally complex cluster with at least three prominent substructures in the central region within 1 Mpc. A large velocity dispersion for the central clump indicates a merging along the line of sight. No significant evidence for morphology or luminosity segrega- tions is found in either sample. With the PEGASE evolutionary synthesis model, the environmental effect on the properties of star formation is confirmed. Faint galaxies in the low-density region tend to have longer time scales of star formation, smaller mean stellar ages, and lower metallicities in their interstellar medium, which is in agreement with the context of the hierarchical cosmological scenario.