The Sydney University Molonglo Sky Survey

A wide-field radio imaging survey of the southern sky at 843 MHz.

Dedication: The Sydney University Molonglo Sky Survey (SUMSS) is dedicated to our friend and colleague Dr. Michael Large, whose expertise and vision made the project possible.

The survey was completed in 2007, and now covers the whole sky
south of declination -30 degrees with |b| > 10 degrees.
The Galactic Plane region |b| < 10 degrees is covered by MGPS-2.

Data Products

The main SUMSS data products are a catalogue of the radio sky at 843 MHz, and a set of 4x4-degree FITS images on a grid which matches and extends that used by the northern NVSS. SUMSS and NVSS have similar sensitivity and resolution, and together cover the whole sky.

• Version 2.1 of the SUMSS Catalogue is now available (2008 March 11).
  • sumsscat.Feb-16-2012 (30MB text file)
  • sumsscat.Feb-16-2012.gz (7MB gzipped file)
    Version 2.1 corrects a bug in 2.0 in which some bright (S>500 mJy) sources were missing from the catalogue. For more information about the version 2 release please consult the MGPS-2 catalogue paper.
  • See older versions of the Catalogue in the Archive.
  • Description of Catalogue format
• Repository of the SUMSS 4 X 4 degree mosaics.
• SUMSS Postage Stamp Server (retrieve images of small areas of sky)
• Mosaic Sky Coverage (gif, 9kb), only completed, publicly released mosaics are shown. Alternate view.
• List of individual SUMSS field centres (ascii, 160kb)
• SUMSS data are also available in Skyview and NED.

SUMSS Catalogue News

Latest information about he SUMSS Catalogue can be found in the SUMSS Catalogue News.

Survey references

A full description of the survey and data catalogue is given in the following two papers:

• Primary reference: D. Bock, M.I. Large and E.M. Sadler (1999) AJ 117, 1578-1593
  ``SUMSS: A Wide-Field Radio Imaging Survey of the Southern Sky. I. Science goals, survey design and instrumentation'' (ADS link)
• Catalogue reference: T. Mauch, T. Murphy, H.J. Buttery, J. Curran, R.W. Hunstead, B. Piestrzynska, J.G. Robertson and E.M. Sadler (2003), MNRAS, 342, 1117-1130
  ``SUMSS: A wide field radio imaging Survey of the Southern Sky. II. The source catalogue'' (ADS link)

Where?

The Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope (MOST) is located near Canberra, Australia, and is operated by the University of Sydney.

Who?

• Full list of SIfA staff and students

Science Papers from SUMSS

• ``A complete sample of Mpc-size double radio sources from SUMSS'' (pdf, 5.2Mb)
  L. Saripalli, R.W. Hunstead, R. Subrahmanyan, E. Boyce
  astro-ph0507055; AJ, 130, 896-922 (2005) (ADS link).
  Figures are available as a gzipped tar file here.
• Catalogue reference:
  ``SUMSS: A wide field radio imaging Survey of the Southern Sky. II. The source catalogue'' (Gzipped Postscript, 2.5Mb)
  T. Mauch, T. Murphy, H.J. Buttery, J. Curran, R.W. Hunstead, B. Piestrzynska, J.G. Robertson and E.M. Sadler.,
  MNRAS, 342, 1117-1130 (2003)
  
• ``SUMSS: Wide-field Radio Imaging of the Southern Sky (Gzipped Postscript, 1.7Mb)
  E.M. Sadler and R.W. Hunstead
  in The New Era of Wide Field Astronomy'',
  eds. R. Clowes, A. Adamson & G. Bromage, ASP Conference Series 232, 53 (2001).
• ``The Sydney University Molonglo Sky Survey (SUMSS) and optical redshift surveys of the southern sky (Gzipped Postscript, 1.3Mb)
  E.M. Sadler and R.W. Hunstead
  in IAU Symposium 199, The Universe at Low Radio Frequencies'',
  ed. A.P. Rao, S-199, in press (2001).
• `` A survey of giant radio galaxies'' (pdf, 7.1Mb)
  Edward Boyce
  Honours Thesis, School of Physics, University of Sydney (2000)
• ``Radio sources in the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey'' (link to electronic paper)
  E.M. Sadler, V.J.McIntyre, C.A. Jackson, R.D. Cannon,
  Pub. Astron. Soc. Aust, 16, 247 (1999).
• ``Cluster halos and other diffuse sources in SUMSS (Gzipped Postscript, 846Kb)
  R.W. Hunstead and the SUMSS team
  in Proceedings of the Ringberg workshop, Diffuse Thermal and Relativistic Plasma in Galaxy Clusters'',
  eds. H Bohringer, L. Feretti, P. Schuecker, MPE Report 271, Oct 1999, p19.
• Primary reference:
  Bock, D., Large, M. and Sadler, E.
  ``SUMSS: A Wide-Field Radio Imaging Survey of the Southern Sky. I. Science goals, survey design and instrumentation'' (ADS link to AJ v117, p1578)
• ``The New Molonglo Radio Survey'' (Gzipped Postscript, 960Kb)
• ``A Wider View From The South'' (Gzipped Postscript, 491Kb)

Related Surveys

• NRAO VLA Sky Survey (NVSS)
• Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-cm (FIRST)
• Westerbork Northern Sky Survey (WENSS)