Mapping mass in the local universe

We only see a small fraction of the matter in the universe, but the rest gives itself away by the impact of its gravity. Peculiar velocities have the potential to be a powerful tool to trace this matter; however, previous peculiar-velocity surveys have struggled to meet their potential because of the large errors on individual measurements, poor statistics, and uneven sky coverage. The 2MASS Tully-Fisher (2MTF) survey will make use of existing high-quality rotations widths, new HI widths, and 2MASS (2 Micron All-Sky Survey) photometry to measure Tully-Fisher distances/peculiar velocities for all bright inclined spirals in the 2MASS redshift survey (2MRS). This survey based on the 2MASS galaxy catalog will provide a qualitatively better sample. It will provide significant improvements in sky coverage especially near the plane of our Galaxy that crosses the poorly understood “great attractor” region. I will give a progress report on the 2MTF survey including a look at over 300 hours of H_I observations from the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) and a report on ongoing southern-hemisphere observations with the Parkes radio telescope. The new spiral I-band field (SFI++) sample is currently the best available peculiar-velocity survey for use in the local universe. I will also report on some preliminary results from this sample.