The MeerKAT 1.3 GHz survey of the Large Magellanic Cloud: Point Source Catalogue

Abstract We present a point source catalogue of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) using observations from the MeerKAT radio telescope across a broad frequency band centred at 1295 MHz (L-Band) with 12 sub-bands and a resolution of 8″×8″. We investigate source flux density distributions and spectral indices and compare these with previous similar radio catalogues such as those conducted with the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope at 888 MHz. This new MeerKAT survey reaches a lower average noise level of 11 μJy beam−1, compared with the previous ASKAP levels of 58 μJy beam−1. This higher sensitivity and resolution allow the detection of a significantly larger number of faint sources. The catalogue includes 339,128 point sources; a substantial increase over the 54,612 sources detected by ASKAP providing critical insights into the population distribution, spectral properties, positional accuracy, and overall improvement in source recovery and survey depth.