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NuSTAR COSMOS Field X-Ray Source Catalog

Metadata Updated: April 10, 2026

To provide the census of the sources contributing to the X-ray background peak above 10 keV, the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) is performing extragalactic surveys using a three-tier "wedding cake" approach. In their paper, the authors present the NuSTAR survey of the COSMOS field, the medium sensitivity, and medium area "tier",covering 1.7 deg<sup>2</sup> and overlapping with both Chandra and XMM-Newton data. This survey consists of 121 NuSTAR observations for a total exposure of ~3 Ms. To fully exploit these data, the authors developed a new detection strategy, carefully tested through extensive simulations. The survey sensitivity at 20% completeness is 5.9, 2.9, and 6.4 x 10<sup>-14</sup> erg cm<sup>-2</sup> s<sup>-1</sup> in the 3-24, 3-8 and 8-24 keV bands, respectively. By combining detections in 3 bands, the survey consists of a sample of 91 NuSTAR sources with luminosities ~ 10<sup>42</sup> - 10<sup>45.5</sup> erg s<sup>-1</sup>and redshifts z ~ 0.04-2.5. Thirty-two sources are detected in the 8-24 keV band with fluxes ~100 times fainter than sources detected by Swift-BAT. Of the 91 detections, all but 4 are associated with a Chandra and/or XMM-Newton point-like counterpart. One source is associated with an extended lower energy X-ray source. The authors present the X-ray (hardness ratio and luminosity)and optical-to-X-ray properties. The observed fraction of candidate Compton-thick active galactic nuclei measured from the hardness ratio is between 13% - 20%. In their paper, the authors discuss the spectral properties of the source named NuSTAR J100259+0220.5 (source number 330) at a redshift z = 0.044, which has the highest hardness ratio in the entire sample. The measured column density exceeds 10<sup>24</sup> cm<sup>-2</sup>, implying the source is Compton-thick. This source was not previously recognized as such without the data at energies >10 keV. This table was created by the HEASARC in August 2015 based on the the machine-readable versions of Table 5 (the COSMOS Field NuSTAR source catalog) that was obtained from the ApJ web site. This is a service provided by NASA HEASARC .

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: See this page for license information.

Downloads & Resources

Dates

Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date April 10, 2026

Metadata Source

Harvested from NASA Data.json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date April 10, 2026
Publisher High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center
Maintainer
Identifier ivo://nasa.heasarc/nucosmosfc
Data Last Modified 2026-04-06
Category Astrophysics
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 026:00
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 36898bf9-5555-44f5-9ccf-3392c8e59f8d
Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
Homepage URL ivo://nasa.heasarc/nucosmosfc
License https://www.usa.gov/government-works
Program Code 026:000
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 0919a1143bc8e083e5d32d5c3c2e58460b7b86e07730926d6ed20b015f8a7cc7
Source Schema Version 1.1

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