GEMS : Galaxy Fitting Catalogs and Testing Parametric Galaxy Fitting Codes : GALFIT and GIM2D

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dc.contributor.utaustinauthorCaldwell, John A. R.en_US
dc.creatorHaeussler, Borisen_US
dc.creatorMcIntosh, Daniel H.en_US
dc.creatorBarden, Marcoen_US
dc.creatorBell, Eric F.en_US
dc.creatorRix, Hans-Walteren_US
dc.creatorBorch, Andreaen_US
dc.creatorBeckwith, Steven V. W.en_US
dc.creatorCaldwell, John A. R.en_US
dc.creatorHeymans, Catherineen_US
dc.creatorJahnke, Knuden_US
dc.creatorJogee, Shardhaen_US
dc.creatorKoposov, Sergey E.en_US
dc.creatorMeisenheimer, Klausen_US
dc.creatorSanchez, Sebastian F.en_US
dc.creatorSomerville, Rachel S.en_US
dc.creatorWisotzki, Lutzen_US
dc.creatorWolf, Christianen_US
dc.date.accessioned2016-10-28T19:38:31Z
dc.date.available2016-10-28T19:38:31Z
dc.date.issued2007-10en_US
dc.description.abstractIn the context of measuring the structures of intermediate-redshift galaxies with HST ACS surveys, we tune, test, and compare two widely used fitting codes (GALFIT and GIM2D) for fitting single-component Sersic models to both simulated and real galaxy data. Our study focuses on the GEMS survey with the sensitivity of typical HST survey data, and we include our final catalog of fit results for all 41,495 objects detected in GEMS. Using simulations, we find that fitting accuracy depends sensitively on galaxy profile shape. Exponential disks are well fit and have small measurement errors, whereas fits to de Vaucouleurs profiles show larger uncertainties owing to the large amount of light at large radii. Both codes provide reliable fits with little systematic error for galaxies with effective surface brightnesses brighter than that of the sky; the formal uncertainties returned by these codes significantly underestimate the true uncertainties (as estimated using the simulations). We find that GIM2D suffers significant systematic errors for spheroids with close companions owing to the difficulty of effectively masking out neighboring galaxy light; there appears to be no work-around to this important systematic in GIM2D's current implementation. While this crowding error affects only a small fraction of galaxies in GEMS, it must be accounted for in the analysis of deeper cosmological images or of more crowded fields with GIM2D. In contrast, GALFIT results are robust to the presence of neighbors because it can simultaneously fit the profiles of multiple companions as well as the galaxy of interest. We find GALFIT's robustness to nearby companions and factor of greater than or similar to 20 faster runtime speed are important advantages over GIM2D for analyzing large HST ACS data sets.en_US
dc.description.departmentMcDonald Observatoryen_US
dc.description.sponsorshipNASA NAG5-13102en_US
dc.description.sponsorshipBundesministerium fur Bildung und Forschung through the Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft und Raumfahrt (DLR) 50 OR 0401en_US
dc.identifierdoi:10.15781/T2N87326D
dc.identifier.citationHäussler, Boris, Daniel H. McIntosh, Marco Barden, Eric F. Bell, Hans-Walter Rix, Andrea Borch, Steven VW Beckwith et al. "Gems: Galaxy fitting catalogs and testing parametric galaxy fitting codes: Galfit and gim2d." The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, Vol. 172, No. 2 (Oct., 2007): 615.en_US
dc.identifier.doi10.1086/518836en_US
dc.identifier.issn0067-0049en_US
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2152/43117
dc.language.isoEnglishen_US
dc.relation.ispartofen_US
dc.relation.ispartofserialAstrophysical Journal Supplement Seriesen_US
dc.rightsAdministrative deposit of works to Texas ScholarWorks: This works author(s) is or was a University faculty member, student or staff member; this article is already available through open access or the publisher allows a PDF version of the article to be freely posted online. The library makes the deposit as a matter of fair use (for scholarly, educational, and research purposes), and to preserve the work and further secure public access to the works of the University.en_US
dc.rights.restrictionOpenen_US
dc.subjectcatalogsen_US
dc.subjectgalaxies : generalen_US
dc.subjectgalaxies : photometryen_US
dc.subjectgalaxies :en_US
dc.subjectstatisticsen_US
dc.subjectmethods : data analysisen_US
dc.subjectsurveysen_US
dc.subjectldss redshift surveysen_US
dc.subjectmass-size relationsen_US
dc.subjectdisk galaxiesen_US
dc.subjectstructuralen_US
dc.subjectparametersen_US
dc.subjectsurface photometryen_US
dc.subjectluminosity-sizeen_US
dc.subjectstellar massen_US
dc.subjectevolutionen_US
dc.subjectdensityen_US
dc.subjectfielden_US
dc.subjectastronomy & astrophysicsen_US
dc.titleGEMS : Galaxy Fitting Catalogs and Testing Parametric Galaxy Fitting Codes : GALFIT and GIM2Den_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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