Catalogue 5XMM-DR15

The 5XMM-DR15 catalogue of serendipitous sources from individual and overlapping XMM-Newton observations has been compiled from 5 303 groups of 14 616 XMM-Newton observations, 11 158 of them overlapping by at least one arcminute in radius and 3 458 non-overlapping. They were taken between 2000 January 19 and 2024 October 24. 5XMM-DR15 is the first main catalogue from the new, overall more sensitive, spectrum-based source detection. The catalogue contains 818 656 unique sources, 411 307 of them multiply observed, with positions and source parameters like fluxes in the XMM-Newton standard energy bands, hardness ratios, quality estimate, and information on inter-observation variability. The parameters are directly derived from the simultaneous fit, and, wherever applicable, additionally calculated for each contributing observation. For lower-quality exposures, not used in source detection to ensure the detection quality, the source parameters are derived from subsequent PSF photometry. The number of parameter measurements (total number of observations of all unique sources) has thus increased to almost 2.58 million. Total fluxes and rates are calculated from the measurements in all contributing images as error-weighted means (formerly: exposure-weighted).
The catalogue aims at exploring the multiply observed sky regions and exploit their survey potential, in particular to study the long-term behaviour of X-ray emitting sources. It thus makes use of the long(er) effective exposure time per sky area and offers the opportunity to investigate flux variability directly through the source detection process. The main catalogue properties are summarised in the table below, the data processing and the stacked source detection are described in the processing summary. More information on the compilation of the catalogues is provided in the online documentation.

The catalogue is available for download as a single file 5XMM_DR15cat_v1.0.fits.gz [2.4 GB] in FITS format and browsable via the web-based interfaces

• IRAP Catalogue Server of the XMM-SSC
• XSA at ESA’s XMM-Newton SOC
• Browse at HEASARC NASA GSFC

Through the XSA, we provide access to the auxiliary charts per source: a broad-band X-ray image, a colour-coded three-band X-ray image, an optical finding chart, and a long-term X-ray light curve. Through xmmssc.aip.de, we provide access to the auxiliary data products per stack: broad-band and energy mosaic images, coverage maps including the number of observations and exposures, and exposure maps, all in FITS format.

The list of observations and stacks processed to create 5XMM-DR15 is available in FITS format: 5xmmdr15_stacklist.fits.gz [2.6 MB]

Watchouts:
5XMM-DR15 was produced without the astrometric correction of previous stacked catalogues. It will be re-introduced with 5XMM-DR16.

Increasing content of the XMM-Newton Serendipitous Source Catalogues