THE HOST GALAXIES OF MICRO-JANSKY RADIO SOURCES

Abstract

We combine a deep 0.5 deg 2 , 1.4 GHz deep radio survey in the Lockman Hole with infrared and optical data in the same field, including the Spitzer Extragalactic Representative Volume Survey (SERVS) and UKIDSS near-infrared surveys, to make the largest study to date of the host galaxies of radio sources with typical radio flux densities 50 Jy. 87% (1274/1467) of radio sources have identifications in SERVS to AB 23.1 at 3.6 or 4.5m, and 9% are blended with bright objects (mostly stars), leaving only 4% (59 objects), which are too faint to confidently identify in the near-infrared. We are able to estimate photometric redshifts for 68% of the radio sources. We use midinfrared diagnostics to show that the source population consists of a mixture of star-forming galaxies, rapidly accreting (cold mode) active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and low accretion rate (hot mode) AGNs, with neither AGNs nor star-forming galaxies clearly dominating. We see the breakdown in the K-z relation in faint radio source samples, and show that it is due to radio source populations becoming dominated by sources with radio luminosities 10 WHz 23 1