SDSS DR12 QSOs [OIII] doublet Virtual Observatory Resource

Authors
  1. Albareti F.D.
  2. Comparat J.
  3. Gutierrez C.M.
  4. Prada F.
  5. Paris I.,Schlegel D.
  6. Lopez-Corredoira M.
  7. Schneider D.P.
  8. Manchado A.,Garcia-Hernandez D.A.
  9. Petitjean P.
  10. Ge J.
  11. Published by
    CDS
Abstract

From the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release 12, which covers the full Baryonic Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) footprint, we investigate the possible variation of the fine-structure constant over cosmological time-scales. We analyse the largest quasar sample considered so far in the literature, which contains 13175 spectra (10363 from SDSS-III/BOSS DR12+2812 from SDSS-II DR7) with redshift z<1. We apply the emission-line method on the [OIII] doublet ({lambda}{lambda}4960, 5008{AA}) and obtain {Delta}{alpha}/{alpha}=(0.9+/-1.8)x10^-5^ for the relative variation of the fine-structure constant. We also investigate the possible sources of systematics: misidentification of the lines, sky OH lines, H{beta} and broad line contamination, Gaussian and Voigt fitting profiles, optimal wavelength range for the Gaussian fits, chosen polynomial order for the continuum spectrum, signal-to-noise ratio and good quality of the fits. The uncertainty of the measurement is dominated by the sky subtraction. The results presented in this work, being systematics limited, have sufficient statistics to constrain robustly the variation of the fine-structure constant in redshift bins ({Delta}z~0.06) over the last 7.9Gyr. In addition, we study the [NeIII] doublet ({lambda}{lambda}3869, 3968{AA}) present in 462 quasar spectra and discuss the systematic effects on using these emission lines to constrain the fine-structure constant variation. Better constraints on {Delta}{alpha}/{alpha}(<10^-6^) using the emission-line method would be possible with high-resolution spectroscopy and large galaxy/qso surveys.

Keywords
  1. surveys
  2. quasars
  3. redshifted
  4. spectroscopy
Bibliographic source Bibcode
2015MNRAS.452.4153A
See also HTML
https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/MNRAS/452/4153
IVOA Identifier IVOID
ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/MNRAS/452/4153
Document Object Identifer DOI
doi:10.26093/cds/vizier.74524153

Access

Web browser access HTML
http://vizier.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/VizieR-2?-source=J/MNRAS/452/4153
https://vizier.iucaa.in/viz-bin/VizieR-2?-source=J/MNRAS/452/4153
http://vizieridia.saao.ac.za/viz-bin/VizieR-2?-source=J/MNRAS/452/4153
IVOA Table Access TAP
http://tapvizier.cds.unistra.fr/TAPVizieR/tap
Run SQL-like queries with TAP-enabled clients (e.g., TOPCAT).
IVOA Cone Search SCS
For use with a cone search client (e.g., TOPCAT).
http://vizier.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/conesearch/J/MNRAS/452/4153/catalog?
https://vizier.iucaa.in/viz-bin/conesearch/J/MNRAS/452/4153/catalog?
http://vizieridia.saao.ac.za/viz-bin/conesearch/J/MNRAS/452/4153/catalog?

History

2016-05-17T12:10:16Z
Resource record created
2016-05-17T12:10:16Z
Created
2024-08-15T20:14:37Z
Updated

Contact

Name
CDS support team
Postal Address
CDS, Observatoire de Strasbourg, 11 rue de l'Universite, F-67000 Strasbourg, France
E-Mail
cds-question@unistra.fr