We present K'-band galaxy counts in the magnitude range 13<K'<20, obtained from two independent surveys near the South Galactic Pole, covering an area of ~ 40 arcmin(2) and ~ 170 arcmin(2) , including ~ 200 and ~ 1000 objects respectively up to a magnitude limit K' ~ 20.0 and K' ~ 19.0. At magnitudes K>18.5 we surveyed an area more than 7 times wider that covered by previous K-band surveys. Our counts are quite in good agreement with those in the literature at magnitudes brighter than K ~ 17, while are systematically lower at fainter magnitudes. We confirm a change in the slope of the dlogN/dm relation at K' ~ 17 from 0.57 to 0.35, but do not find the bump shown by other K-band surveys in the magnitude range 16<K<20. Furthermore 10% of the galaxies brighter than K' ~ 18 have B-K'<3. We suggest that these blue objects represent a population of sub-L(*) nearby evolving galaxies.
No takes yet. Share an insight, caveat, or question.
Saracco et al. (1997) studied this question.