The PRIsm MUlti-Object Survey (PRIMUS) I: Survey Overview and Characteristics

Understand

We present the PRIsm MUlti-object Survey (PRIMUS), a spectroscopic faint galaxy redshift survey to z~1.

• PRIMUS uses a low-dispersion prism and slitmasks to observe ~2,500 objects at once in a 0.18 deg^2 field of view, using the IMACS camera on the Magellan I Baade 6.5m telescope at Las Campanas Observatory.
• PRIMUS covers a total of 9.1 deg^2 of sky to a depth of i_AB~23.5 in seven different deep, multi-wavelength fields that have coverage from GALEX, Spitzer and either XMM or Chandra, as well as multiple-band optical and near-IR coverage.
• PRIMUS includes ~130,000 robust redshifts of unique objects with a redshift precision of dz/(1+z)~0.005.