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Description
The 140-ft telescope at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory has been used to extend the 5-GHz strong source (S) survey over an area of 1.14 steradian. Some 240 sources have been detected in this region, of which 135 are above the completeness limit of 0.6f.u. The distribution of spectral indices for sources above the completeness limit is much broader than for samples selected from long-wavelength surveys, owing to an increase in the fraction of compact sources with flat spectra. For about half of the sources selected at 6 cm, the spectral index {alpha}>-0.5. Analysis of the dependence of the spectral index on the flux density shows that, as expected from the 408-MHz number counts and spectral index distribution, at 5 GHz there are fewer flat spectra among the weak sources than among the stronger ones. The spectral index distributions for the identified galaxies and quasars show the familiar forms: the galaxies have a strong concentration near {alpha}=-0.8 with a small tail extending toward flat spectra. The quasars show a much broader distribution of indices, but the fraction (80%) of quasars having flat spectra ({alpha}>-0.5) is much greater than that found in the low-frequency surveys. The number-flux density relation for various groups of sources selected from the 5-GHz survey show that the anomalously steep slope is confined to (a) unidentified sources, (b) sources with steep spectra ({alpha}<-0.5), and (c) sources located in the north galactic hemisphere. Sources identified with radio galaxies or quasars, or which have flat spectra, or which are in the south galactic hemisphere all show a number-flux density slope near -1.5.
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