Five supernova survey galaxies in the southern hemisphere. I. Optical and near-infrared database

TL;DR

This paper presents a detailed optical and near-infrared database of 3838 galaxies monitored for supernovae, analyzing their properties and photometric measurements to refine supernova rate estimates.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive dataset of galaxy properties, including new morphologies and calibrated magnitudes, and compares different infrared surveys to identify systematic measurement differences.

Findings

Large discrepancies found between DENIS and POSS-II/UKST I band magnitudes due to spectral response differences.

No significant systematic differences between DENIS and 2MASS NIR measurements, enabling data combination.

Photometric uncertainties are mainly influenced by galaxy morphology, inclination, and survey calibration issues.

Abstract

The determination of the supernova (SN) rate is based not only on the number of detected events, but also on the properties of the parent galaxy population. This is the first paper of a series aimed at obtaining new, refined, SN rates from a set of five SN surveys, by making use of a joint analysis of near-infrared (NIR) data. We describe the properties of the 3838 galaxies that were monitored for SNe events, including newly determined morphologies and their DENIS and POSS-II/UKST I, 2MASS and DENIS J and Ks and 2MASS H magnitudes. We have compared 2MASS, DENIS and POSS-II/UKST IJK magnitudes in order to find possible systematic photometric shifts in the measurements. The DENIS and POSS-II/UKST I band magnitudes show large discrepancies (mean absolute difference of 0.4 mag), mostly due to different spectral responses of the two instruments, with an important contribution (0.33 mag rms) from the large uncertainties in the photometric calibration of the POSS-II and UKST photographic plates. In the other wavebands, the limiting near infrared magnitude, morphology and inclination of the galaxies are the most influential factors which affect the determination of photometry of the galaxies. Nevertheless, no significant systematic differences have been found between of any pair of NIR magnitude measurements, except for a few percent of galaxies showing large discrepancies. This allows us to combine DENIS and 2MASS data for the J and Ks filters.