The Lamost Survey of Background Quasars in the Vicinity of the Andromeda and Triangulum Galaxies. Ii. Results From the Commissioning Observations and the Pilot Surveys

Abstract

We present new quasars discovered in the vicinity of the Andromeda and Triangulum galaxies with the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope, also named the Guoshoujing Telescope, during the 2010 and 2011 observational seasons. Quasar candidates are selected based on the available Sloan Digital Sky Survey, Kitt Peak National Observatory 4 m telescope, Xuyi Schmidt Telescope Photometric Survey optical, and Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer near-infrared photometric data. We present 509 new quasars discovered in a stripe of ∼135 deg 2 from M31 to M33 along the Giant Stellar Stream in the 2011 pilot survey data sets, and also 17 new quasars discovered in an area of ∼100 deg 2 that covers the central region and the southeastern halo of M31 in the 2010 commissioning data sets. These 526 new quasars have i magnitudes ranging from 15.5 to 20.0, redshifts from 0.1 to 3.2. They represent a significant increase of the number of identified quasars in the vicinity of M31 and M33. There are now 26, 62, and 139 known quasars in this region of the sky with i magnitudes brighter than 17.0, 17.5, and 18.0, respectively, of which 5, 20, and 75 are newly discovered. These bright quasars provide an invaluable collection with which to probe the kinematics and chemistry of the interstellar/intergalactic medium in the Local Group of galaxies. A total of 93 quasars are now known with locations within 2.• 5 of M31, of which 73 are newly discovered. Tens of quasars are now known to be located behind the Giant Stellar Stream, and hundreds are behind the extended halo and its associated substructures of M31. The much enlarged sample of known quasars in the vicinity of M31 and M33 can potentially be utilized to construct a perfect astrometric reference frame to measure the minute proper motions (PMs) of M31 and M33, along with the PMs of substructures associated with the Local Group of galaxies. Those PMs are some of the most fundamental properties of the Local Group.

LAMOST Spectroscopic Survey of the Galactic Anticentre (LSS-GAC): target selection and the first release of value-added catalogues

“…Being the largest and most luminous galaxy of the Local Group, M 31 hosts a variety of interesting targets including planetary nebulae (PNe), H ii regions, supergiants and globular clusters that are easily detectable with the LAMOST Huo et al 2010Huo et al , 2013. Kinematic and elemental abundance studies of PNe in M 31 provide important information of the chemical composition, kinematics and structure of M 31 as well as the surrounding, extremely extended and complex stellar streams revealed by the recent deep imaging surveys (e.g., Ibata et al 2001Ibata et al , 2007McConnachie et al 2009), and are thus of great interest for the understanding of the assemblage history of the Local Group.…”

The LAMOST spectroscopic survey of globular clusters in M31 and M33. I. catalog and new identifications

“…In addition to GCs and candidates, other interesting objects targeted in this area include planetary nebulae (PNe) and background quasars, as well as H ii regions and supergiants in M31 and M33. Some of the early results from this campaign have published, see Yuan et al (2010) for planetary nebulae and Huo et al (2010Huo et al ( , 2013 for background quasars. For GCs, our purpose is two-fold -to build up a large, systematic spectroscopic dataset for GCs and candidates in this sky area, and to search for new ones.…”

The Discovery of Quasi-stellar Objects behind M31 and M33

“…J004655.52+422050.2 is one of the ten QSOs discovered behind M31 in a search specifically to study the ISM by Rao et al (2013); however, it is the only one coincident with an LGGS source, with the others located further from the stellar disk. Finally, three were discovered as part of the LAMOST survey for QSOs (Huo et al 2013) behind M31 and M33. Again, note that the other 23 QSOs in our fields were not detected by that effort.…”