THE HETDEX PILOT SURVEY. I. SURVEY DESIGN, PERFORMANCE, AND CATALOG OF EMISSION-LINE GALAXIES

We present a catalog of emission-line galaxies selected solely by their emission-line fluxes using a wide-field integral field spectrograph. This work is partially motivated as a pilot survey for the upcoming Hobby-Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment. We describe the observations, reductions, detections, redshift classifications, line fluxes, and counterpart information for 397 emission-line galaxies detected over 169 {open_square}' with a 3500-5800 A bandpass under 5 A full-width-half-maximum (FWHM) spectral resolution. The survey's best sensitivity for unresolved objects under photometric conditions is between 4 and 20x 10{sup -17} erg s{sup -1} cm{sup -2} depending on the wavelength, and Ly{alpha} luminosities between 3 x 10{sup 42} and 6 x 10{sup 42} erg s{sup -1} are detectable. This survey method complements narrowband and color-selection techniques in the search of high-redshift galaxies with its different selection properties and large volume probed. The four survey fields within the COSMOS, GOODS-N, MUNICS, and XMM-LSS areas are rich with existing, complementary data. We find 105 galaxies via their high-redshift Ly{alpha} emission at 1.9 44 {open_square}' which appear to be extended Ly{alpha} nebulae. We also find three high-z objects with rest-frame Ly{alpha} EW above the level believed to be achievable with normal star formation, EW{sub 0}>240 A. Future papers will investigate the physical properties of this sample.« less