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VIII/15 Parkes Radio Sources Catalogue (PKSCAT90) (Wright+ 1990)
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Parkes Radio Sources Catalogue, Version 1.01
Wright A.E. and Otrupcek R.
<Australia Telescope National Facility, Parkes (1990)>
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ADC_Keywords: Radio sources - 685
Description:
PKSCAT90 consists of radio and optical data for 8264 radio sources.
It covers essentially all the sky south of declination +27 degrees but
largely excludes the Galactic Plane and the Magellanic Cloud regions.
The latter zones have been the subject of other, specialist surveys.
A few data errors in Version 1.00 have been corrected in the present
edition. This version of the Parkes Radio source Catalogue entitled
"PKSCAT90 Version 1.01" is intended for use on IBM PC-type machines.
Note by A. Wright:
Users should note that PKSCAT90 was produced at a time when relational
databases were in their infancy. In the future we anticipate making
the individual data sources available separately --- through such
search systems as SIMBAD --- rather than in an "omnibus" catalogue
like PKSCAT90. For both the Northern and Southern hemisphere, superior
and deeper finding surveys now exist: the 87GB Catalog in the North,
(Condon et al., catalog <VIII/14>) and the PMN catalogues (Griffith
and Wright, catalog <VIII/38>) in the South.
File Summary:
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FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
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ReadMe 80 . This file
pkscat90.dat 208 8264 The Catalogue
refs.dat 99 152 References
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: pkscat90.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 10 A10 --- Bname B1950 source name
11- 17 A7 --- Alias Alias/other catalogue names
18- 19 I2 h RAh Right Ascension B1950.0 (hours)
21- 22 I2 min RAm Right Ascension B1950.0 (minutes)
24- 27 F4.1 s RAs Right Ascension B1950.0 (seconds)
28 A1 --- DE- Declination B1950.0 (sign)
29- 30 I2 deg DEd Declination B1950.0 (degrees)
32- 33 I2 arcmin DEm Declination B1950.0 (minutes)
35- 36 I2 arcsec DEs Declination B1950.0 (seconds)
37- 40 A4 --- Ident Identification (1)
41- 45 F5.2 mag Mag ? Magnitude
(the format is either F4.1 or F4.2)
46- 50 F5.3 --- z ? Redshift (reference in r_z)
51- 58 F8.3 Jy S80 ? Flux density at 80 MHz
59- 66 F8.3 Jy S178 ? Flux density at 178 MHz
67- 74 F8.3 Jy S408 ? Flux density at 408 MHz
75- 82 F8.3 Jy S635 ? Flux density at 635 MHz
83- 90 F8.3 Jy S1410 ? Flux density at 1410 MHz (21cm)
91- 98 F8.3 Jy S2700 ? Flux density at 2700 MHz (11cm)
99-106 F8.3 Jy S5000 ? Flux density at 5000 MHz (6cm)
107-114 F8.3 Jy S8400 ? Flux density at 8400 MHz
115-122 F8.3 Jy S22000 ? Flux density at 22000 MHz
123-124 I2 h RA2000h Right Ascension J2000 (hours)
126-127 I2 min RA2000m Right Ascension J2000 (minutes)
129-135 F7.4 s RA2000s Right Ascension J2000 (seconds)
136 A1 --- DE2000- Declination J2000 (sign)
137-138 I2 deg DE2000d Declination J2000 (degrees)
140-141 I2 arcmin DE2000m Declination J2000 (minutes)
143-148 F6.3 arcsec DE2000s Declination J2000 (seconds)
149-158 A10 --- Jname J2000 Name
159-163 F5.2 arcsec errPos ? positional accuracy in arcsec.
(to be read as "better than")
164-183 A20 --- r_Ident Comma-separated references for Identification
(see file refs.dat)
184-203 A20 --- r_z Comma-separated references for z
(see file refs.dat)
204-208 A5 "YY.MM" SpDate Year.Month for which an optical spectrum was
obtained, but from which a definite redshift
could not be determined
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Note (1):
Beginning with this version of the catalogue, new identification and
field classification codes have been used, mainly for the unidentified
or "blank-field" sources. The following table lists both the new and
the old codes.
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Code Description Old Code
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===> Identified sources:
BLC BL Lacertae object BLC
D Diffuse galaxy, bright galaxies in clusters D
DB Double galaxy DB
E Elliptical Galaxy E
G Galaxy too faint to classify G
HII HII region HII
IRR Irregular object IRR
N N galaxy, bright cored galaxy N
PN Planetary Nebular PN
Q Quasi-stellar object or Quasar (confirmed) Q
QC Quasar with a continuous optical spectrum QC
S Spiral galaxy S
SB Barred Spiral galaxy SB
Sc Spiral galaxy (type C) SC
SNR SuperNova Remnant SNR
S0 Spiral galaxy with ellipticity of zero S0
(nearly circular)
* Stellar object of neutral colour IIIS
in good positional agreement with
the radio source
===> Unidentified Sources
Xg one or more galaxies in the area II
covered by the position error of the source
but no identification claimed
Xs blank field: one or more stars of normal colour III
in the error box
Xsa blank field: obscured by absorption IIIA
X blank field: no absorption apparent IIIB
Xs+ blank field: crowded star field IIIC
Xa blank field: heavily obscured. IV
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NOTE: a ? following any code specifies that that property is uncertain
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: refs.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 6 A6 --- Ref Reference Code
9- 27 A19 --- BibCode 19-digit reference code, as used in
ADS, CDS and NED
29- 99 A71 --- Authors List of authors
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History:
The original Parkes radio catalogue was compiled from
major radio surveys with the Parkes radiotelescope at
frequencies of 408 MHz and 2700 MHz. This work spanned a
period of nearly 20 years and was undertaken largely by
John Bolton and his colleagues. Since then, improved
positions, optical identifications and redshifts have been
obtained for many of the sources in the Catalogue.
Furthermore, flux densities at several frequencies have
supplemented the original surveys so that the measurements
now cover the frequency range 80 - 22,000 MHz. However
coverage at the highest frequencies is still sparse.
Important contributions to the usefulness of the
catalogue have been radio data from the Molonglo 408 MHz
survey and the 80 MHz Culgoora measurements of Slee et al.
PKSCAT90 should thus be regarded as a compendium of radio
and optical data about southern radiosources. However, at
the moment, it contains only sources originally found in
the Parkes 2700 MHz Survey (see e.g. Part 14, Bolton et
al, 1979, Aust J Phys, Astrophys Suppl, No. 46 and
references therein)
The original radio survey data of the Catalogue and the
optical identifications have been published in a series of
papers in the Australian Journal of Physics (see above
reference). The associated optical spectral data on which
redshifts were obtained has also been published, mainly
in Astrophysical Journal and Monthly Notices of the Royal
Astronomical Society.
About the completeness levels of the Catalogue in
various parts of the sky: users should note that the
sky zone between -4 and +4 degrees has been the
subject of a re-survey and is now complete to 0.25 Jy.
About PKSCAT90:
The PKSCAT90 database is made available for astronomical
research purposes at a cost of $40.00 to cover the cost of
floppy disks, packing and postage. However we request that
users acknowledge their use of the catalogue data in
publications as:
Parkes Catalogue, 1990, Australia Telescope National Facility
The New Version Of The Catalogue:
This catalogue differs in several important ways from the
older (VAX/VMS only) version (which we shall refer to as
"PKSCAT85") in that:
1. It has a different and more compact structure than
PKSCAT85 and thus takes up less disc space.
2. It contains J2000 (FK5) positions and names. This is the
IAU-preferred system. Generally the B1950 data is for
convenience only and is given to a limited precision of 1
arcsec.
3. Improved positions for many sources have been included.
Following the J2000 position is an explicit upper limit to
the positional accuracy in arcsecs.
5. The new catalogue contains 8400MHz fluxes from recent
Parkes measurements of around 1100 of the stronger sources.
6. References to identifications and redshifts are available
for some sources in the catalogue. The codes placed after
the J2000 position can be used to refer to sources in a
table at the end of this information.
Nomenclature Notes:
In the past, Parkes source names have been given in a format
similar to:
1934-638
Unfortunately this is inconsistent with the IAU
recommendations as to nomenclature (see e.g. Dickel et al,
1987, A & A Suppl. 68, 75-80
or <http://cdsweb.u-strasbg.fr/iau-spec.html>)
since:
(i) it doesn't specify the Equinox and Equator (e.g. B1950
or J2000) of the position from which the name is derived and
(ii) decimal fractions of degrees are not permitted in the
"declination-part" of the name
However, because they are so widely used, we have kept the
existing nomenclature for all "1950-type" names, but include a
B in front of them.
The J2000 names are given as:
J1229+0203
where the letter signifies J2000 equinox and equator (FK5-type
position), the next 4 digits are the hours and minutes of
right ascension and the sign and final digits are the degrees
and minutes of declination.
Thus, the source 3C273 in the new system will be referred to
as:
PKSB1226+023 or PKSJ1229+0203 if the observatory designation
is important or, more informally, B1226+023 or J1229+0203
The latter style of naming has been adopted for the catalogue
software.
For the Future:
In the future, the catalogue will be expanded to include extra
information from: new radio surveys, new identifications, many
more references, improved positions and variability of fluxes.
Furthermore we propose to extend the coverage of the Catalogue
northward of +27 degrees declination using data from the
northern surveys so as eventually to produce an all-sky,
"Master" radio catalogue.
Most importantly, we would very much like to receive
references to pre-print and published information which
supersedes or augments data in the present catalogue. Please
assist by sending such material to:
Alan Wright & Robina Otrupcek, PKSCAT Project
ATNF, Parkes
P.O. Box 276
PARKES
NSW 2870
Australia
Alternatively we can be contacted by E-MAIL on:
PKSCAT@ATPARKES.RP.CSIRO.AU
Next, in addition to the IBM/ PC version, a mainframe
version of PKSCAT90 is now available in VAX/VMS format
together with suitable interrogation and report
generating programs. We are also preparing an Apple
Macintosh version of PKSCAT90 for those users who have
access to the FileMaker database program. Distribution is
planned for later this year. The handling and postage
prices will be the same as for the PC version.
Finally, we are preparing a Radio Atlas of the southern
sky using data from the PKSCAT90 database. This will be in
a similar format to the optical, "Norton's" star atlas and
should be available by 1 August 1990.
Alan Wright & Robina Otrupcek 10 May 1990
Modifications of the data files:
* June 1993, corrections from H. Andernach (hja@vilspa.esa.es)
a) The source B0000-177 is NOT 3C465 (but source B2335+267)
b) The last source B0420-086 is misplaced
In references:
BE66b is AuJP 19, 275 (not p. 27)
W67 is MN 135, p. 339 (not p. 24)
* 10-May-1996: Alan Wright [Parkes], Francois Ochsenbein [CDS]:
Documentation rewritten.
* 10-Jul-1999: catalogue reformatted at CDS to allow an automatic
recognition of all numeric fields (magnitude, redshift, flux densities)
References were also reformatted, and the bibcodes were added.
* 17-Jul-1999: The source B1246-410 was wrongly associated to NGC4296,
corrected to NGC4696 (H. Andernach <heinz@astro.ugto.mx>)
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(End) Alan Wright [Parkes], Francois Ochsenbein [CDS] 10-May-1996