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XMM-COSMOS Catalog of Optical/IR Counterparts

Metadata Updated: September 19, 2025

This table contains the final optical identifications of the medium-depth (~60 ks), contiguous (2 degree<sup>2</sup>) XMM-Newton survey of the COSMOS field. XMM-Newton has detected ~1800 X-ray sources down to limiting fluxes of ~5 x 10<sup>-16</sup>, ~3 x 10<sup>-15</sup>, and ~7 x 10<sup>-15</sup> erg cm<sup>-2</sup> s<sup>-1</sup> in the 0.5-2 keV, 2-10 keV, and 5-10 keV bands, respectively (~1 x 10<sup>-15</sup>, ~6 x 10<sup>-15</sup>, and ~1 x 10<sup>-14</sup> erg cm<sup>-2</sup> s<sup>-1</sup>, in the three bands, respectively, over 50% of the area). The work is complemented by an extensive collection of multi-wavelength data from 24 microns to UV, available from the COSMOS survey, for each of the X-ray sources, including spectroscopic redshifts for >~50% of the sample, and high-quality photometric redshifts for the rest. The XMM-Newton and multi-wavelength flux limits are well matched: 1760 (98%) of the X-ray sources have optical counterparts, 1711 (~95%) have IRAC counterparts, and 1394 (~78%) have MIPS 24 um detections. Thanks to the redshift completeness (almost 100%) the authors were able to constrain the high-luminosity tail of the X-ray luminosity function confirming that the peak of the number density of log L<sub>X</sub> > 44.5 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) is at z ~ 2. Spectroscopically identified obscured and unobscured AGNs, as well as normal and star-forming galaxies, present well-defined optical and infrared properties. The authors devised a robust method to identify a sample of ~150 high-redshift (z > 1), obscured AGN candidates for which optical spectroscopy is not available. They were able to determine that the fraction of the obscured AGN population at the highest (L<sub>X</sub> > 10<sup>44</sup> erg s<sup>-1</sup>) X-ray luminosity is ~15%-30% when selection effects are taken into account, providing an important observational constraint for X-ray background synthesis. The authors studied in detail the optical spectrum and the overall spectral energy distribution of a prototypical Type 2 QSO (source number 2028), caught in a stage transitioning from being starburst dominated to AGN dominated, which was possible to isolate only thanks to the combination of X-ray and infrared observations. This table was created by the HEASARC in July 2010 based on the electronic version of Table 2 from the paper which was obtained from the Astrophysical Journal web site. <p> The HEASARC has made some changes to this material in order to make it more compliant with CDS/IAU Nomenclature and HEASARC table standards: <p> (i) The original naming convention suggested by the authors used a prefix of 'XMMC_' and the J2000.0 RA and Dec position in decimal degrees to 10<sup>-5</sup> degrees precision, e.g., XMMC_150.10515+1.98082'; the HEASARC has replaced these names by alternative new ones (in the alt_name parameter) of the form 'XMMU JHHMMSS.s+DDMMSS' where the prefix is the usual one for XMM-Newton sources and the remainder of the field is the J2000.0 equatorial coordinates truncated to 0.1 seconds of time in RA and to 1 arcsecond in Declination; <p> (ii) We have used for the alt_name parameter the naming convention recommended by the Dictionary of Nomenclature of Celestial Objects for XMM-COSMOS sources, viz. the "XMMC' prefix and the source (XID) number, e.g., "XMMC 2028'. This is a service provided by NASA HEASARC .

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 19, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from NASA Data.json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 19, 2025
Publisher High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center
Maintainer
Identifier ivo://nasa.heasarc/xmmcosmoid
Data Last Modified 2025-09-10
Category Astrophysics
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 026:00
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id e91e4c29-8b03-4192-a7c7-7c2a9b1e33c1
Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
Homepage URL https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/W3Browse/all/xmmcosmoid.html
Program Code 026:000
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 5512fd16090808d90409228502849e096337d622a38a4301f3add7cc1500f364
Source Schema Version 1.1

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