What Is Galaxy 'Completeness'?

[jl294]

Reading through various publications for Luminosity Functions and it mentions completeness a lot without ever explaining what it actually is. Could someone shed light on this please?

Thanks

 

[jl294]

Also, what is 'K-correction'?

Cheers

 

[zhermes]

Reading through various publications for Luminosity Functions and it mentions completeness a lot without ever explaining what it actually is. Could someone shed light on this please?

'completeness' refers to how accurately collected data reflects the actual distribution of sources. Any astronomical survey will only detect the objects which are above the limiting brightness of the telescope/survey---everything dimmer, will not be seen. Therefore, anytime you're analyzing the statistics of your sample, you have to consider the 'completeness' of the survey---i.e. what types of sources (and how many) were detected, compared to what sources (and how many) weren't detected.

 

[zhermes]

Also, what is 'K-correction'?

Consider using google.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K_correction