LESS photometric redshift survey (Wardlow+, 2011)

SMGs typically have faint optical and near-IR counterparts (e.g. Ivison et al. 2002MNRAS.337....1I), so we require deep photometry for accurate photometric redshift estimates. The ECDF-S was chosen for this survey because it is an exceptionally well-studied field and as such we are able to utilize data from extensive archival imaging and spectroscopic surveys. For completeness and uniformity, we only consider surveys that cover a large fraction of the ECDF-S rather than the smaller and deeper central Chandra Deep Field-South (CDF-S) region. Therefore, we utilize the MUltiwavelength Survey by Yale-Chile (MUSYC; Gawiser et al. 2006, Cat. J/ApJS/162/1) near-IR survey for U- to K-band imaging (Taylor et al. 2009, Cat. J/ApJS/183/295), and the Spitzer IRAC/MUSYC Public Legacy in ECDF-S (SIMPLE) imaging for Spitzer IRAC data (Damen et al. 2011, cat. J/ApJ/727/1). We also include U-band data from the deep GOODS/VIMOS imaging survey of the CDF-S (Nonino et al. 2009ApJS..183..244N); although this covers only ~60 per cent of LESS SMGs, it is valuable for galaxies that are undetected at short wavelengths in the shallower MUSYC survey. In addition, we have carried out deep near-IR observations in the J and Ks bands with the HAWK-I at the ESO-VLT (ID: 082.A-0890, PI: N. Padilla). (2 data files).