TITLE:
The Sixth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
AUTHOR(S):
Jennifer K. Adelman-McCarthy,
Marcel A. Agueros,
Sahar S. Allam,
Carlos Allende Prieto,
Kurt S. J. Anderson,
Scott F. Anderson,
James Annis,
Neta A. Bahcall,
C.A.L. Bailer-Jones,
Ivan K. Baldry,
J. C. Barentine,
Bruce A. Bassett,
Andrew C. Becker,
Timothy C. Beers,
Eric F. Bell,
Andreas A. Berlind,
Mariangela Bernardi,
Michael R. Blanton,
John J. Bochanski,
William N. Boroski,
Jarle Brinchmann,
J. Brinkmann,
Robert J. Brunner,
Tamas Budavari,
Samuel Carliles,
Michael A. Carr,
Francisco J. Castander,
David Cinabro,
R. J. Cool,
Kevin R. Covey,
Istvan Csabai,
Carlos E. Cunha,
James R. A. Davenport,
Ben Dilday,
Mamoru Doi,
Daniel J. Eisenstein,
Michael L. Evans,
Xiaohui Fan,
Douglas P. Finkbeiner,
Scott D. Friedman,
Joshua A. Frieman,
Masataka Fukugita,
Boris T. GĻansicke,
Evalyn Gates,
Bruce Gillespie,
Karl Glazebrook,
Jim Gray,
Eva K. Grebel,
James E. Gunn,
Vijay K. Gurbani,
Patrick B. Hall,
Paul Harding,
Michael Harvanek,
Suzanne L. Hawley,
Jeffrey Hayes,
Timothy M. Heckman,
John S. Hendry,
Robert B. Hindsley,
Christopher M. Hirata,
Craig J. Hogan,
David W. Hogg,
Joseph B. Hyde,
Shin-ichi Ichikawa,
Zeljko Ivezic,
Sebastian Jester,
Jennifer A. Johnson,
Anders M. Jorgensen,
Mario Juric,
Stephen M. Kent,
R. Kessler,
S. J. Kleinman,
G. R. Knapp,
Richard G. Kron,
Nikolay Kuropatkin,
Donald Q. Lamb,
Hubert Lampeitl,
Svetlana Lebedeva,
Young Sun Lee,
R. French Leger,
Sebastien Lepine,
Marcos Lima,
Huan Lin,
Daniel C. Long,
Craig P. Loomis,
Jon Loveday,
Robert H. Lupton,
Olena Malanushenko,
Viktor Malanushenko,
Rachel Mandelbaum,
Bruce Margon,
John P. Marriner,
David Martinez-Delgado,
Takahiko Matsubara,
Peregrine M. McGehee,
Timothy A. McKay,
Avery Meiksin,
Heather L. Morrison,
Jeffrey A. Munn,
Reiko Nakajima,
Eric H. Neilsen Jr.,
Heidi Jo Newberg,
Robert C. Nichol,
Tom Nicinski1,
Maria Nieto-Santisteban,
Atsuko Nitta,
Sadanori Okamura,
Russell Owen,
Hiroaki Oyaizu,
Nikhil Padmanabhan,
Kaike Pan,
Changbom Park,
John Peoples Jr.,
Jeffrey R. Pier,
Adrian C. Pope,
Norbert Purger,
M. Jordan Raddick,
Paola Re Fiorentin,
Gordon T. Richards,
Michael W. Richmond,
Adam G. Riess,
Hans-Walter Rix,
Constance M. Rockosi,
Masao Sako,
David J. Schlegel,
Donald P. Schneider,
Matthias R. Schreiber,
Axel D. Schwope,
Uros Seljak,
Branimir Sesar,
Erin Sheldon,
Kazu Shimasaku,
Thirupathi Sivarani,
J. Allyn Smith,
Stephanie A. Snedden,
Matthias Steinmetz,
Michael A. Strauss,
Mark SubbaRao,
Yasushi Suto,
Alexander S. Szalay,
Istvan Szapudi,
Paula Szkody,
Max Tegmark,
Aniruddha R. Thakar,
Christy A. Tremonti,
Douglas L. Tucker,
Alan Uomoto,
Daniel E. Vanden Berk,
S. Vidrih,
Michael S. Vogeley,
Nicole P. Vogt,
Yogesh Wadadekar,
David H. Weinberg,
Andrew A. West,
Simon D.M. White,
Brian C. Wilhite,
Brian Yanny,
D. R. Yocum,
Donald G. York,
Idit Zehavi,
Daniel B. Zucker.
DATE:
2007 Jul 23 (ApJS, submitted);
2007 Jul 23 (arXiv, v1, posted);
2007 Oct 17 (revised);
2007 Oct 18 (ApJS, accepted);
2007 Oct 19 (arXiv, v2, posted);
2008 Mar 31 (ApJS, published).
AVAILABILITY:
arXiv:0707.3413 (free);
U Chicago Press (requires subscription).
PUBLICATION INFORMATION: Astrophys. J. Supp. 175, 297--313 (2008).
ABSTRACT:
This paper describes the Sixth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. With this data
release, the imaging of the Northern Galactic Cap is now complete. The survey contains images
and parameters of roughly 287 million objects over 9583 deg2, including scans over a large range of
Galactic latitudes and longitudes. The survey also includes 1.27 million spectra of stars, galaxies,
quasars and blank sky (for sky subtraction) selected over 7425 deg2. This release includes much
more extensive stellar spectroscopy than previously, and also includes detailed estimates of stellar
temperatures, gravities, and metallicities. The results of improved photometric calibration are now
available, with uncertainties of roughly 1% in g, r, i, and z, and 2% in u, substantially better than the
uncertainties in previous data releases. The spectra in this data release have improved wavelength
and flux calibration, especially in the extreme blue and extreme red, leading to the qualitatively
better determination of stellar types and radial velocities. The spectrophotometric fluxes are now tied
to point spread function magnitudes of stars rather than fiber magnitudes. This gives more robust
results in the presence of seeing variations, but also implies a change in the spectrophotometric scale,
which is now brighter by roughly 0.35 mags. Systematic errors in the velocity dispersions of galaxies
have been fixed, and the results of two independent codes for determining spectral classifications and
redshifts are made available. Additional spectral outputs are made available, including calibrated
spectra from individual 15-minute exposures and the sky spectrum subtracted from each exposure.
We also quantify a recently recognized under-estimation of the brightnesses of galaxies of large angular
extent due to poor sky subtraction; the bias can exceed 0.2 mag for galaxies brighter than r = 14.
ADS BIBLIOGRAPHIC CODE: 2008ApJS..175..297A
COMMENTS:
SDSS Publication #797.