Authors: David Carter, Paul Goudfrooij, Bahram Mobasher, Henry C. Ferguson, Thomas H. Puzia, Alfonso L. Aguerri, Marc Balcells, Dan Batcheldor, Terry J. Bridges, Jonathan I. Davies, Peter Erwin, Alister W. Graham, Rafael Guzmán, Derek Hammer, Ann Hornschemeier, Carlos Hoyos, Michael J. Hudson, Avon Huxor, Shardha Jogee, Yutaka Komiyama, Jennifer Lotz, John R. Lucey, Ronald O. Marzke, David Merritt, Bryan W. Miller, Neal A. Miller, Mustapha Mouhcine, Sadanori Okamura, Reynier F. Peletier, Steven Phillipps, Bianca M. Poggianti, Ray M. Sharples, Russell J. Smith, Neil Trentham, R. Brent Tully, Edwin Valentijn, Gijs Verdoes Kleijn
Abstract:
We describe the HST ACS Coma cluster Treasury survey, a deep two-passband
imaging survey of one of the nearest rich clusters of galaxies, the Coma
cluster (Abell 1656).
The survey was designed to cover an area of 740 arcmin2 in regions of different
density of both galaxies and intergalactic medium within the cluster. The ACS
failure of January 27th 2007 leaves the survey 28% complete, with 21 ACS pointings
(approximately 230 arcmin2) complete, and partial data comprising either
50% or 75% of the planned exposure time for a further 4 pointings (approximately
44 arcmin2).
The survey depth for 10 detections (0.1 mag photometric errors) predicted
using the ACS exposure time calculator, is g' = 26.75 mag in the F475W filter, and
IC=25.95 mag in the F814 filter, using the AB magnitude system. For extended
sources, the equivalent limits for a 1 arcsecond2 constant surface brightness region
are g' = 25.8 mag arcsec2 and IC = 25.0 mag arcsec2.
We highlight several of the motivating science goals of the survey, including
the study of the faint end of the cluster galaxy luminosity function, structural parameters
of dwarf galaxies, stellar populations and their effect on colors and color
gradients, the evolution of morphological components in a dense environment, the
nature of ultra compact dwarf galaxies, and the globular cluster populations of
cluster galaxies of a range of luminosties and types. This survey will also provide
a local rich cluster benchmark for various well known global scaling relations and
explore new relations pertaining to the nuclear properties of galaxies.