The Heraklion Extragalactic Catalogue (HECATE): a value-added galaxy catalogue for multi-messenger astrophysics

TL;DR

The HECATE catalogue is a comprehensive, multi-wavelength galaxy database designed to support multi-messenger astrophysics research in the local Universe, including galaxy demographics and transient event studies.

Contribution

It provides a homogenised, extensive all-sky galaxy catalogue with detailed properties, facilitating diverse astrophysical investigations and multi-messenger studies.

Findings

Contains 204,733 galaxies up to z=0.047 within 200 Mpc.

>50% completeness in B-band luminosity density up to 170 Mpc.

Enables demographic, transient, and gravitational-wave counterpart studies.

Abstract

We present the Heraklion Extragalactic Catalogue, or HECATE, an all-sky value-added galaxy catalogue, aiming to facilitate present and future multi-wavelength and multi-messenger studies in the local Universe. It contains 204,733 galaxies up to a redshift of 0.047 (D<200 Mpc), and it is >50% complete in terms of the B-band luminosity density at distances in the 0-170 Mpc range. By incorporating and homogenising data from astronomical databases and multi-wavelength surveys, the catalogue offers positions, sizes, distances, morphological classifications, star-formation rates, stellar masses, metallicities, and nuclear activity classifications. This wealth of information can enable a wide-range of applications, such as: (i) demographic studies of extragalactic sources, (ii) initial characterisation of transient events, and (iii) searches for electromagnetic counterparts of gravitational-wave events. The catalogue is publicly available to the community at a dedicated portal, which will also host future extensions in terms of the covered volume, and data products.