THE MONTREAL BLUE GALAXY SURVEY .1. 1ST LIST OF ULTRAVIOLET-BRIGHT CANDIDATES

We describe and present the first results of a UV-bright galaxy survey using the Montreal-Cambridge-Tololo (MCT) plate collection. Visual inspection of 57 CTIO Curtis Schmidt plates, covering more than 1300 deg2, has resulted in the identification of 95 UV-bright galaxies brighter than B = 15.5. Even though 80% of these objects are IRAS sources, barely 20% have their nature already established. The initial result of our survey shows that the bulk of our UV-bright candidates are narrow emission-line galaxies commonly known as starburst or H II galaxies. The fraction of AGNs found is somewhat less than 10%, but comparable to what has been found by the Markarian survey. We expect to find approximately 500 UV-bright galaxies in the 7000 deg2 of the MCT Survey with b < - 40-degrees. As we go further south, a large number of bright new objects will be discovered.