LARGE KUIPER BELT OBJECTS - THE MAUNA-KEA 8K CCD SURVEY

We describe a large-area ecliptic survey designed to assess the sky-pl ane surface density of bright Kuiper Belt objects. We used an 8192 x 8 192 pixel CCD mosaic to image 51.5 deg(2) to a 50% detection threshold red magnitude m(R) = 22.5. Thirteen new Kuiper Belt objects were iden tified in the survey, including some of the brightest and, presumably, largest known examples. We use Monte Carlo models to assess the effec ts of observational bias in our survey and to examine (1) the size dis tribution of bright objects in the Kuiper Belt, (2) the possible exist ence of a cutoff in the size distribution at large radii, (3) the intr insic ratio of Plutinos to nonresonant (''classical'') Kuiper Belt obj ects, (4) the intrinsic ratio of populations in the 3:2 and 2:1 mean m otion resonances, and (5) the radial extent of the Kuiper Belt.