An Australia Telescope Compact Array 20-cm radio continuum study of the Large Magellanic Cloud |
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| Authors: | A Hughes L Staveley-Smith S Kim M Wolleben M Filipovi&#; |
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| Institution: | Centre for Supercomputing and Astrophysics, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn VIC 3122, Australia;CSIRO Australia Telescope National Facility, PO Box 76, Epping NSW 1710, Australia;School of Physics M013, University of Western Australia, Crawley WA 6009, Australia;Department of Astronomy and Space Science, Sejong University, KwangJin-gu, KunJa-dong 98, Seoul 143-747, Korea;Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton AB T6G 2V4, Canada;National Research Council Canada, Herzberg Insitute of Astrophysics, Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory, Penticton BV V2A 6J9, Canada;University of Western Sydney, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith South, DC, NSW 1797, Australia |
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| Abstract: | We present a mosaic image of the 1.4-GHz radio continuum emission from the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) observed with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) and the Parkes Telescope. The mosaic covers  with an angular resolution of 40 arcsec, corresponding to a spatial scale of ～10 pc in the LMC. The final image is suitable for studying emission on all scales between 40 arcsec and the surveyed area. In this paper, we discuss (i) the characteristics of the LMC's diffuse and compact radio continuum emission, (ii) the fraction of the emission produced by thermal processes and the implied star formation rate in the LMC and (iii) variations in the radio spectral index across the LMC. Two non-standard reduction techniques that we used to process the ATCA visibility data may be of interest for future wide-field radio continuum surveys. The data are open to the astronomical community and should be a rich resource for studies of individual objects such as supernova remnants, H ii regions and planetary nebulae as well as extended features such as the diffuse emission from synchrotron radiation. |
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| Keywords: | techniques: interferometric galaxies: individual: Large Magellanic Cloud galaxies: ISM Magellanic Clouds radio continuum: galaxies |
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