H-alpha Full Sky Map

 Short name[s] used to specify survey:HAlpha,HALPHA/Comp,H-Alpha Comp,H-Alpha Composite,H-alpha

Description
The full-sky H-alpha map (6' FWHM resolution) is a composite of the Virginia Tech Spectral line Survey (VTSS) in the north and the Southern H-Alpha Sky Survey Atlas (SHASSA) in the south. Stellar artifacts and bleed trails have been carefully removed from these maps. The Wisconsin H-Alpha Mapper (WHAM) survey provides a stable zero-point over 3/4 of the sky on a one degree scale. This composite map can be used to provide limits on thermal bremsstrahlung (free-free emission) from ionized gas known to contaminate microwave-background data. The map (in Rayleighs; 1R=106/4pi photons/cm2/s/sr), an error map, and a bitmask are provided in 8640x4320 Cartesian projections as well as HEALPIX (Nside 256, 512, and 1024) projections on the H-Alpha Full-Sky Map website.

CopyrightPublic domain
Regime Optical
Frequency 456.79 THz
Bandpass 456.2-457.38 THz
Coverage All-sky
PixelScale 2.5'
PixelUnits Rayleighs (R)
Resolution 6' FWHM
Coordinates Galactic
Equinox 2000
Projection Rectangular
Epoch 1997 to 2002
Reference "A Full-Sky H-alpha Template for Microwave Foreground Prediction" Douglas P. Finkbeiner 2003. This paper may be downloaded from ADS.