Paper detail

Deep Westerbork 1.4 GHz Imaging of the Bootes Field

We present the results from our deep (16x12 hour) Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT) observations of the approximately 7 square degree Bootes Deep Field, centered at 14h32m05.75s, 34d16'47.5" (J2000). Our survey consists of 42 discrete pointings, with enough overlap to ensure a uniform sensitivity across the entire field, with a limiting sensitivity of 28 microJy (1 sigma rms). The catalog contains 3172 distinct sources, of which 316 are resolved by the 13"x27" beam. The Bootes field is part of the optical/near-infrared imaging and spectroscopy survey effort conducted at various institutions. The combination of these data sets, and the deep nature of the radio observations will allow unique studies of a large range of topics including the redshift evolution of the luminosity function of radio sources, the K-z relation and the clustering environment of radio galaxies, the radio / far-infrared correlation for distant starbursts, and the nature of obscured radio loud AGN.