The HETDEX Survey Emission-line Exploration and Source Classification
Finkelstein, Steven L.; Kollatschny, Wolfram; Gebhardt, Karl; Gronwall, Caryl; Gawiser, Eric; Ciardullo, Robin; Liu, Chenxu; Davis, Dustin; Farrow, Daniel J.; Zeimann, Gregory R.; Hill, Gary J.; Cooper, Erin Mentuch; Jeong, Donghui; Saito, Shun; Fabricius, Maximilian; Zhang, Yechi; Landriau, Martin; Hopp, Ulrich; Komatsu, Eiichiro; Feldmeier, John J.; Tuttle, Sarah; House, Lindsay R.; Wold, Isak G. B.
United States, Germany, Japan
Abstract
The Hobby-Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment (HETDEX) is an untargeted spectroscopic survey that aims to measure the expansion rate of the universe at z ~ 2.4 to 1% precision for both H(z) and D A (z). HETDEX is in the process of mapping in excess of one million Lyα emitting (LAE) galaxies and a similar number of lower-z galaxies as a tracer of the large-scale structure. The success of the measurement is predicated on the post-observation separation of galaxies with Lyα emission from the lower-z interloping galaxies, primarily [O II], with low contamination and high recovery rates. The Emission Line eXplorer (ELiXer) is the principal classification tool for HETDEX, providing a tunable balance between contamination and completeness as dictated by science needs. By combining multiple selection criteria, ELiXer improves upon the 20 Å rest-frame equivalent width cut commonly used to distinguish LAEs from lower-z [O II] emitting galaxies. Despite a spectral resolving power, R ~ 800, that cannot resolve the [O II] doublet, we demonstrate the ability to distinguish LAEs from foreground galaxies with 98.1% accuracy. We estimate a contamination rate of Lyα by [O II] of 1.2% and a Lyα recovery rate of 99.1% using the default ELiXer configuration. These rates meet the HETDEX science requirements. * Based on observations obtained with the Hobby-Eberly Telescope, which is a joint project of the University of Texas at Austin, the Pennsylvania State University, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, and Georg-August-Universität Göttingen. The HET is named in honor of its principal benefactors, William P. Hobby and Robert E. Eberly.