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M. Prescott, C. Impey (University of Arizona), N. Scoville (California Institute of Technology), COSMOS Collaboration
The COSMOS (Cosmic Evolution Survey) project will be the largest HST imaging survey ever, covering two square degrees with the ACS instrument. The survey is designed to sample the full range of cosmic structures up to scales of 100 Mpc, map the evolution of galaxy morphology, galaxy merging, and star formation out to z of 2, use weak lensing to reconstruct the dark matter distribution out to z of 1, and study the joint evolution of galaxies and black holes via the AGN population. Extensive multi-wavelength observations of the field have also been committed for X-ray, UV, FIR, NIR, millimeter, and radio wavelengths. We present results from a pilot project using only the central 10.4 by 10.4 arcmin portion of the field. The goal is to understand the reliability of galaxy morphological information derived from GALFIT and other methods. Morphology has been derived from both g and i ACS images in terms of bulge/disk ratio and Sersic index. These measures have been augmented by CAS and Gini coefficients as a way of identifying galaxies that are disturbed or interacting, or where the axisymmetric assumptions of GALFIT are not warranted. We present results on how morphology correlates with global quantities such as luminosity, scale length, and mean surface brightness as well as with various broad band color combinations, which serve as proxies for overall stellar populations and ages. Using photo-z's we study all these relationships in terms of cosmic evolution. This pilot project will be used to optimize analysis strategies for the much larger amount of data in the overall COSMOS project.
Funding for this work was provided by a NSF Graduate Fellowship and a NASA/HST GO Grant.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 36 #2
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