The Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey (FCSS)

The Fornax cluster is one of the closest large galaxy clusters. In the Fornax Cluster Catalog (Ferguson 1989) 340 members and many more "possible members" of the cluster are listed but these cannot be confirmed without additional measurements. We cannot tell whether a galaxy that appears small is a dwarf member of the cluster or is a more distant giant galaxy which lies in the same direction but is not associated with the cluster. The Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey was designed to address this problem by using the wide-field spectrograph 2dF on the Anglo-Australian Telescope to measure the redshifts and hence distances to some 10,000 objects in the direction of the cluster.

Resources

Refereed FCSS Papers

1. Drinkwater M.J., Phillipps S., Jones J.B., Gregg M.D., Deady J.H., Davies J.I., Parker Q.A., Smith R.M., Sadler E.M., 2000, A&A, 355, 900, The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey -- I. Survey Strategy and Preliminary Results on the Redshift Distribution of a Complete Sample of Stars and Galaxies (link)
2. Drinkwater M.J., Phillipps, S., Gregg, M.D., Parker, Q.A., Smith, R.M., Davies, J.I., Jones, J.B., Sadler, E.M 1999, ApJ, 511, L97, The Fornax Spectroscopic Survey: Unresolved Compact Emission Line Galaxies (link)
3. Drinkwater M.J., Jones, J.B., Gregg, M.D., Phillipps, S., 2000, PASA, 17, 227 Compact Stellar Systems in the Fornax Cluster: Massive Star Clusters or Extremely Compact Dwarf Galaxies? (link)
4. Meyer M.J., Drinkwater M.J., Phillipps S., Couch W.J., 2001, MNRAS, 324, 343 Quasars from a Complete Spectroscopic Survey (link)
5. Phillipps S., Drinkwater M.J., Gregg M.D., Jones, J.B., 2001, ApJ, 560, 201 Ultracompact Dwarf Galaxies in the Fornax Cluster (link)
6. Deady J.H., Boyce P.J., Phillipps S., Drinkwater M..J., Karick A., Jones J.B., Gregg M.D., Smith R.M., 2001, MNRAS, 336, 851 The Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey: A Sample of Confirmed Cluster Dwarfs (link)
7. Firth P., Drinkwater M.J., Evstigneeva E.A., Gregg M.D., Karick A.M., Jones J.B., Phillipps S., 2007, MNRAS, 382, 1342 Compact Stellar Systems Around NGC1399 (link)
8. Morris R.A.H., Phillipps S., Jones J.B., Drinkwater M.J., Gregg M.D., Couch W.J., Parker Q.A., Smith R.M., 2007, A&A, 476, 59 2MASS Galaxies in the Fornax Cluster Spectroscopic Survey (link)