K-Band Galaxy Counts in the South Galactic Pole Region

Abstract

We present new K-band galaxy number counts from K=13 to 20.5 obtained from $K'$-band surveys in the south galactic pole region, which cover 180.8 arcmin$^2$ to a limiting magnitude of K=19, and 2.21 arcmin$^2$ to K=21. These are currently the most precise K-band galaxy counts at $17.5<K<19.0$ because the area of coverage is largest among the existing surveys for this magnitude range. The completeness and photometry corrections are estimated from the recovery of simulated galaxy and stellar profiles added to the obtained field image. Many simulations were carried out to construct a probability matrix which corrects the galaxy counts at the faint-end magnitudes of the surveys so the corrected counts can be compared with other observations. The K-band star counts in the south galactic pole region to $K=17.25$ are also presented for use to constrain the vertical structure of the Galaxy.