THE SEGUE STELLAR PARAMETER PIPELINE. III. COMPARISON WITH HIGH-RESOLUTION SPECTROSCOPY OF SDSS/SEGUE FIELD STARS

Abstract

We report high-resolution spectroscopy of 125 field stars previously observed as part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and its program for Galactic studies, the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration (SEGUE). These spectra are used to measure radial velocities and to derive atmospheric parameters, which we compare with those reported by the SEGUE Stellar Parameter Pipeline (SSPP). The SSPP obtains estimates of these quantities based on SDSS ugriz photometry and low-resolution (R similar to 2000) spectroscopy. For F- and G-type stars observed with high signal-to-noise ratios (S/Ns), we empirically determine the typical random uncertainties in the radial velocities, effective temperatures, surface gravities, and metallicities delivered by the SSPP to be 2.4 km s(-1), 130 K (2.2%), 0.21 dex, and 0.11 dex, respectively, with systematic uncertainties of a similar magnitude in the effective temperatures and metallicities. We estimate random errors for lower S/N based on numerical simulations.

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Affiliated Institutions

• Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics US
• Texas Tech University US
• The Ohio State University US
• Carnegie Institution for Science US
• University of California, Santa Cruz US
• Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory US
• National Astronomical Observatory of Japan JP
• Max Planck Institute for Astronomy DE
• University College London GB
• The University of Texas at Austin US
• Michigan State University US

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