IAU02034
Presentation type requested: EITHER
MAPPING THE PEAK OF THE QSO ACTIVITY EPOCH
Zlatan I Tsvetanov
Johns Hopkins University
Modern quasar surveys such as SDSS and 2QZ are extending our optical horizons to dramatic new redshift and faintness limits. However, these and other optically selected quasar surveys are incomplete in the redshift range of 2.3 < z < 3.3, due to contamination by Galactic stars with similar colors. We have undertaken to resolve this incompleteness by using the SDSS protometry and 2dF spectrograph on AAT to target quasars in this observationally difficult redshift range. All SDSS stellar objects with the expected colors of quasars in these ranges are selected down to i'=21.0. To date we have covered ~100 deg^2 out of our 300 deg^2 goal. Our discovery rate is ~2 quasars per deg^2 in the targeted redshift range. We have found 202 quasars, and will continue to assemble a total sample of approximately 500 quasars, which will be used to better constrain the epoch of maximum quasar activity, clustering, and evolution. We will present a preliminary estimate of the quasar spatial density at the peak of QSO activity and compare it with results from SDSS and 2dF in the adjacent redshift ranges. We will also discuss the faint (M_B < -23) quasar luminosity function at the peak epoch.
Chiu Kuenley , Zheng Wei , Glazebrook Karl , Bridges Terry , Boyle Brian
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