Introduction

Those with ideas for future newsletter items should contact the LSST:UK Project Managers (George Beckett and Terry Sloan: lusc_pm@mlist.is.ed.ac.uk), while everyone is encouraged to subscribe to the Rubin Observatory Digest for more general news from the US observatory team.

Bob Mann

The low-surface-brightness Universe: unlocking LSST’s extragalactic discovery space

The low-surface-brightness (LSB) Universe, defined as the domain that is undetectable in past wide-area surveys, represents the extra-galactic discovery space in LSST’s deep-wide images. LSB galaxies (which include all dwarf galaxies at cosmological distances and massive diffuse disks) dominate the galaxy number density. And LSB structures, such as intra-cluster light and merger-indued tidal features, offer strong constraints on our theoretical paradigm. However, while LSST’s unique combination of area and depth is capable of opening up the LSB Universe, its ability to do so depends on the preservation of LSB flux by the data processing pipeline. Developing precise sky subtraction algorithms that preserve LSB flux is key to enabling LSST’s extragalactic discovery space and the purpose of this project (WP 3.7).

Aaron to add some highlights from our work to date.

Aaron Watkins

DESC Tomographic Challenge

Joe Zuntz

Merlin article

Merlin Fisher-Levine Bob Mann

Recent LSST:UK outputs

LSST:UK has recently produced the following technical reports.

Terry Sloan