CANDIDATE CLUSTERS OF GALAXIES AT z > 1.3 IDENTIFIED IN THE SPITZER SOUTH POLE TELESCOPE DEEP FIELD SURVEY

• Published in: The Astrophysical journal Vol. 797; no. 2; pp. 109 - 11
• Main Authors: Rettura, A., Martinez-Manso, J., Stern, D., Mei, S., Ashby, M. L. N., Brodwin, M., Gettings, D., Gonzalez, A. H., Stanford, S. A., Bartlett, J. G.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Astronomical Society 20.12.2014
• Subjects: ALGORITHMS; ANGULAR CORRELATION; Astrophysics; ASTROPHYSICS, COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY; Clusters; COSMOLOGY; Galactic clusters; GALAXIES; GALAXY CLUSTERS; MASS; NONLUMINOUS MATTER; Physics; RED SHIFT; South Pole; TELESCOPES; UNIVERSE; X RADIATION; X-rays; Antarctica, South Pole
• ISSN: 1538-4357; 0004-637X; 1538-4357
• DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/797/2/109

We present 279 galaxy cluster candidates at z > 1.3 selected from the 94 deg[sup 2] Spitzer South Pole Telescope Deep Field (SSDF) survey. We use a simple algorithm to select candidate high-redshift clusters of galaxies based on Spitzer/IRAC mid-infrared data combined with shallow all-sky optical data. We identify distant cluster candidates adopting an over-density threshold that results in a high purity (80%) cluster sample based on tests in the Spitzer Deep, Wide-Field Survey of the Bootes field. The rich data set will allow direct or stacked measurements of Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect decrements or X-ray masses for many of the SSDF clusters presented here, and enable a systematic study of the most distant clusters on an unprecedented scale. We measure the angular correlation function of our sample and find that these candidates show strong clustering.