WISP

WISP is a large HST "pure-parallel" program using the WFC3 G102 and G141 grisms to obtain images, spectra, and catalogs of star-forming galaxies between redshifts 0.5 to 2.5. The primary science goals are to measure the star formation history over the last ~10 billion years, probe galaxy clustering on Mpc scales at redshifts 1 < z < 2, constrain the evolution of dust extinction and metallicity as functions of mass and luminosity, and to conduct a serendipitous search for highly luminous Lyman alpha emitters beyond redshifts z > 6. 

Update 08/23/ 2024

Data release 3 presents reduced images and catalogues of photometric and emission-line data (~230,000 and ~8,000 sources, respectively) for the WISP survey. The data products incorporate the HST data, various ground-based facilities (ugri bands), and Spitzer IRAC (Infrared Array Camera). Coverage in at least one additional filter beyond the WFC3/IR data are available for roughly half of the fields (227 out of 483), with ~20 percent (86) having coverage in six or more filters from u band to IRAC 3.6um (0.35-3.6um). For the lower spatial resolution (and shallower) ground-based and IRAC data, the team performs PSF (point spread function)-matched, prior-based, deconfusion photometry (i.e. forced-photometry) using the TPHOT software to optimally extract measurements or upper limits. The WISP emission-line detection algorithm adopts a continuous wavelet transformation that significantly reduces the number of spurious sources.

Update 05/09/2017

This release (DR2) provides products created using an updated version of the WISP data reduction pipeline (V6.2). Compared to the version used in DR1 (V5.0), V6.2 has improved both the astrometry and the photometry, as described below, and supersedes the DR1 V5.0 data.

• Astrometry:  The ASTRODRIZZLE (now included in the 'astroconda' package) “tweakreg" procedure was used to improve astrometric accuracy.
• Photometry:  Source positions were extracted from combined J+H images (instead of a single image), providing higher sensitivity for detection. The aperture based on the J+H images was then fed to aXe for both the G102 and G141 spectra extractions.
• Other improvements include:
  • a multi-component sky solution
  • an updated Bad Pixel (BP) mask was used in the computation of the uncertainty and contamination

It also increases the number of fields by a factor of 3 (390 fields). It adds 2D spectral cutouts for all objects in the fields and includes several filters in the science images. Multiple spatial resolutions for images are available for some fields too.

While the emission line catalog and the photometric catalog (DR3) are available only via direct download links below, all other observations are available in the MAST Portal and astroquery. Set the 'Provenance Name' filter to WISP in the Portal Advanced Search to match all observations. See the Portal Guide for Advanced Search for detailed information. All observations can be downloaded for each target as a bundle or individually retrieved by selecting the download basket. To access the preview images, uncheck Minimum Recommended Products in the download basket. See the Portal retrieval methods. The observations can also be retrieved programmatically using the astroquery.mast module. The code example below retrieves all products.

from astroquery.mast import Observations
all_obs = Observations.query_criteria(provenance_name="wisp")
data_products = Observations.get_product_list(all_obs)
Observations.download_products(data_products, curl_flag=True)

• MAST Portal

  

  A web-based interface for cross-mission searches of data at MAST or the Virtual Observatory.

  Portal

• MAST Astroquery

  

  Search for and download WISP data products programmatically in Python.

  MAST Astroquery

Direct download