24 new radio-bright quasars spectra

These quasars have been selected by combining an optical dropout selection driven by the g-, r-, and z-bands from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Legacy Imaging Surveys with low-frequency radio observations from the LOFAR Two-metre Sky Survey. Our radio detection requirement strongly decreases the contamination of stellar sources and allows for selecting these quasars in a broad redshift range.

Despite selecting our quasar candidates using fewer and less conservative colour restrictions, both the optical and near-infrared colours, Ly{alpha} emission line properties, and dust reddening, E(B-V), measurements of our quasar sample do not deviate from the known radio-quiet quasar population, suggesting similar optical quasar properties of the radio-loud and radio-quiet quasar population at high-z. Our campaign demonstrates the potential for discovering new high-z quasar populations through next generation radio continuum surveys.