A 1.4-GHz survey of the southern European Large-Area ISO Survey region

A deep survey of the European Large-Area ISO Survey (ELAIS) field in the southern celestial hemisphere thereinafter Sl)has been carried out with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) at 1.4 GHz. The S1 region, covering about 4 deg(2), has also been surveyed in the mid-and far-infrared (5-200 mu m) with the Infrared Space Observatory (ISO). The radio survey provides uniform coverage of the entire SI region, with a sensitivity (5 sigma) of 0.4 mJy over the whole area and 0.2 mJy in the centre. To this sensitivity, virtually all the radio counterparts of the far-infrared extragalactic ISO sources should be detected. This paper presents a radio sample - complete at the 5 sigma level - consisting of 581 sources detected at 1.4 GHz. Of these radio sources, 349 have peak flux density in the range 0.2-1 mJy, forming a new homogeneous sample of sub-mJy radio sources. Due to its size, depth and multiwaveband coverage, the sample will allow us to study in greater detail the sub-mJy radio source population. The full catalogue will be available from http://athena.ph.ic.ac.uk/pubs.html.