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Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS)

Mission Characteristics

Lifetime: 1997-2001
Wavelength:
  • J-band (1.25 µm)
  • H-band (1.65 µm)
  • Ks-band (2.17 µm)
Area Coverage: All Sky
Instruments:
  • 1.3-m telescopes at Mt. Hopkins and CTIO, Chile
  • 3-channel cameras using 256x256 arrays of HgCdTe detectors
Science Products:
  • Point Source Catalog (PSC) consisting of over 500 million stars and galaxies
  • Extended Source Catalog (XSC) consisting of 1.6 million resolved galaxies
  • Large Galaxy Atlas (LGA) consisting of ~600 nearby galaxies and globular clusters
  • All-Sky Quicklook and Atlas images providing full coverage of the infrared sky
Canonical Paper: Skrutskie et al. (2006)
Please include the following standard acknowledgment in any published material that makes use of 2MASS data products:
"This publication makes use of data products from the Two Micron All Sky Survey, which is a joint project of the University of Massachusetts and the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center/California Institute of Technology, funded by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Science Foundation."

All-Sky Release Services

2MASS Image Services Delivering Atlas images from the 2MASS All-Sky Release.
All-Sky Extended Source Image Server J, H, Ks and 3-color composite "postage stamp" images of extended sources.
Large Galaxy Atlas Service Mosaic images (FITS format), jpeg previews, plots, and source characterization measurements for over 500 of the largest galaxies imaged by 2MASS.
Large Galaxy Atlas (using Atlas) Use Atlas to retrieve multiple FITS images covering a wide area of the sky from the 2MASS Large Galaxy Atlas.
Large Galaxy Atlas Cutouts Use IRSA's Image Cutouts Service to generate small "cutout" FITS (and JPEG) images from the LGA image collection.
General Catalog Search Access All-Sky catalogs.
Basic Catalog Search Quick access to the All-Sky PSC and XSC catalogs.
Finder Chart Visualization tool to cross-compare image data sets from various missions.
All-Sky Statistical Analysis Tool Estimate the number of 2MASS sources within a given radius of a sky location, with magnitude and color distribution tables

Other Resources

2MASS Website 2MASS site at IPAC.
2MASS Data Release Documentation 2MASS Data Release Explanatory Supplements and FAQ, from the 2MASS website.