New data release of MUSE data cubes of the Fornax3D Survey

Published: 25 Jan 2023
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The Fornax3D survey is an integral field spectroscopic survey of the Fornax cluster of galaxies. This new data release contains mosaiced IFS MUSE cubes with their white lamp images for the 31 galaxies brighter than mB=15 within the virial radius of the cluster. The total data volume is 121.5 Gb. The survey was conducted under the ESO programme 296.B-5054(A), PI M. Sarzi and E. Iodice, with MUSE at the ESO VLT in wide-field mode. This instrument configuration ensures a spatial sampling of 0.2×0.2 arcsec2, a wavelength coverage from 4650 to 9300 Å with a spectral sampling of 1.25 Å/pixel, and a nominal spectral resolution of FWHM = 2.5 Å at 7000 Å. The main science goals of the survey are to understand the assembly history of the Fornax cluster and of the early-type galaxies, study the formation of substructures in galaxies and the properties of globular cluster and planetary nebulae population. For more information on the background and goals, please consult the latest paper by Sarzi, Iodice et al. in The Messenger.

Several targeted galaxies were observed with multiple pointings, up to three, depending on their angular extent. Whenever multiple pointings are available, they are merged together into a final mosaic. The total integration times for the central and middle fields are about 1 hour, while a total integration of 1.5 hours was required in the outer regions to reach the limiting surface brightness of mB= 25 mag/arcsec2. The observations were taken in good seeing conditions with a median FWHM = 0.72’’. For more information on the data of this release, please consult the comprehensive release description.

The data products are available either from the Science Portal or via Table Access Protocol. The DOI assigned to the data collection is 10.18727/archive/82.