The NICMOS snapshot survey of nearby galaxies

We present "snapshot" observations with the Near-Infrared Camera and Multi- Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) on board the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) of 9 4 nearby galaxies from the Revised Shapley Ames Catalog. Images with 0." 2 resolution were obtained in two filters, a broadband continuum filter (F160 W, roughly equivalent to the H band) and a narrowband filter centered on th e Pa alpha line (F187N or F190N, depending on the galaxy redshift) with the 51 " x 51 " held of view of the NICMOS camera 3. A first-order continuum s ubtraction is performed, and the resulting line maps and integrated Pa alph a line fluxes are presented. A statistical analysis indicates that the aver age Pa alpha surface brightness in the central regions is highest in early- type (Sa-Sb) spirals.