A&A 462, 811–825 (2007) Astronomy DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361:20065296 & c ESO 2007 Astrophysics Superclusters of galaxies from the 2dF redshift survey I. The catalogue J. Einasto1, M. Einasto1,E.Tago1, E. Saar1, G. Hütsi1, M. Jõeveer1, L. J. Liivamägi1, I. Suhhonenko1, J. Jaaniste2, P. Heinämäki3, V. Müller4, A. Knebe4, and D. Tucker5 1 Tartu Observatory, 61602 Tõravere, Estonia e-mail:
[email protected] 2 Estonian University of Life Sciences 3 Tuorla Observatory, Väisäläntie 20, Piikkiö, Finland 4 Astrophysical Institute Potsdam, An der Sternwarte 16, 14482 Potsdam, Germany 5 Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, MS 127, PO Box 500, Batavia, IL 60510, USA Received 28 March 2006 / Accepted 25 October 2006 ABSTRACT Aims. We use the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey data to compile catalogues of superclusters for the Northern and Southern regions of the 2dFGRS, altogether 543 superclusters at redshifts 0.009 ≤ z ≤ 0.2. Methods. We analyse methods of compiling supercluster catalogues and use results of the Millennium Simulation to investigate possible selection effects and errors. We find that the most effective method is the density field method using smoothing with an Epanechnikov kernel of radius 8 h−1 Mpc. Results. We derive positions of the highest luminosity density peaks and find the most luminous cluster in the vicinity of the peak, this cluster is considered as the main cluster and its brightest galaxy the main galaxy of the supercluster. In catalogues we give equa- torial coordinates and distances of superclusters as determined by positions of their main clusters. We also calculate the expected total luminosities of the superclusters.