No Arabic abstract
We present high signal-to-noise galaxy-galaxy lensing measurements of the BOSS CMASS sample using 250 square degrees of weak lensing data from CFHTLenS and CS82. We compare this signal with predictions from mock catalogs trained to match observables including the stellar mass function and the projected and two dimensional clustering of CMASS. We show that the clustering of CMASS, together with standard models of the galaxy-halo connection, robustly predicts a lensing signal that is 20-40% larger than observed. Detailed tests show that our results are robust to a variety of systematic effects. Lowering the value of $S_{rm 8}=sigma_{rm 8} sqrt{Omega_{rm m}/0.3}$ compared to Planck2015 reconciles the lensing with clustering. However, given the scale of our measurement ($r<10$ $h^{-1}$ Mpc), other effects may also be at play and need to be taken into consideration. We explore the impact of baryon physics, assembly bias, massive neutrinos, and modifications to general relativity on $DeltaSigma$ and show that several of these effects may be non-negligible given the precision of our measurement. Disentangling cosmological effects from the details of the galaxy-halo connection, the effects of baryons, and massive neutrinos, is the next challenge facing joint lensing and clustering analyses. This is especially true in the context of large galaxy samples from Baryon Acoustic Oscillation surveys with precise measurements but complex selection functions.
Recently, Leauthaud et al discovered that the small-scale lensing signal of Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) galaxies is up to 40% lower than predicted by the standard models of the galaxy-halo connections that reproduced the observed galaxy stellar mass function (SMF) and clustering. We revisit such lensing is low discrepancy by performing a comprehensive Halo Occupation Distribution (HOD) modelling of the SMF, clustering, and lensing of BOSS LOWZ and CMASS samples at Planck cosmology. We allow the selection function of satellite galaxies to vary as a function of stellar mass as well as halo mass. For centrals we assume their selection to depend only on stellar mass, as informed by the directly measured detection fraction of the redMaPPer central galaxies. The best-fitting HOD successfully describes all three observables without over-predicting the small-scale lensing signal. This indicates that the model places BOSS galaxies into dark matter halos of the correct halo masses, thereby eliminating the discrepancy in the one-halo regime where the signal-to-noise of lensing is the highest. Despite the large uncertainties, the observed lensing amplitude above 1 Mpc/h remains inconsistent with the prediction, which is however firmly anchored by the large-scale galaxy bias measured by clustering at Planck cosmology. Therefore, we demonstrate that the lensing is low discrepancy on scales below 1 Mpc/h can be fully resolved by accounting for the halo mass dependence of the selection function. Lensing measurements with improved accuracy is required on large scales to distinguish between deviations from Planck and non-linear effects from galaxy-halo connections.
We compare predictions for galaxy-galaxy lensing profiles and clustering from the Henriques et al. (2015) public version of the Munich semi-analytical model of galaxy formation (SAM) and the IllustrisTNG suite, primarily TNG300, with observations from KiDS+GAMA and SDSS-DR7 using four different selection functions for the lenses (stellar mass, stellar mass and group membership, stellar mass and isolation criteria, stellar mass and colour). We find that this version of the SAM does not agree well with the current data for stellar mass-only lenses with $M_ast > 10^{11},M_odot$. By decreasing the merger time for satellite galaxies as well as reducing the radio-mode AGN accretion efficiency in the SAM, we obtain better agreement, both for the lensing and the clustering, at the high mass end. We show that the new model is consistent with the signals for central galaxies presented in Velliscig et al. (2017). Turning to the hydrodynamical simulation, TNG300 produces good lensing predictions, both for stellar mass-only ($chi^2 = 1.81$ compared to $chi^2 = 7.79$ for the SAM), and locally brightest galaxies samples ($chi^2 = 3.80$ compared to $chi^2 = 5.01$). With added dust corrections to the colours it matches the SDSS clustering signal well for red low mass galaxies. We find that both the SAMs and TNG300 predict $sim 50,%$ excessive lensing signals for intermediate mass red galaxies with $10.2 < log_{10} M_ast [ M_odot ] < 11.2$ at $r approx 0.6,h^{-1},mathrm{Mpc}$, which require further theoretical development.
We study the Voronoi volume function (VVF) -- the distribution of cell volumes (or inverse local number density) in the Voronoi tessellation of any set of cosmological tracers (galaxies/haloes). We show that the shape of the VVF of biased tracers responds sensitively to physical properties such as halo mass, large-scale environment, substructure and redshift-space effects, making this a hitherto unexplored probe of both primordial cosmology and galaxy evolution. Using convenient summary statistics -- the width, median and a low percentile of the VVF as functions of average tracer number density -- we explore these effects for tracer populations in a suite of N-body simulations of a range of dark matter models. Our summary statistics sensitively probe primordial features such as small-scale oscillations in the initial matter power spectrum (as arise in models involving collisional effects in the dark sector), while being largely insensitive to a truncation of initial power (as in warm dark matter models). For vanilla cold dark matter (CDM) cosmologies, the summary statistics display strong evolution and redshift-space effects, and are also sensitive to cosmological parameter values for realistic tracer samples. Comparing the VVF of galaxies in the GAMA survey with that of abundance matched CDM (sub)haloes tentatively reveals environmental effects in GAMA beyond halo mass (modulo unmodelled satellite properties). Our exploratory analysis thus paves the way for using the VVF as a new probe of galaxy evolution physics as well as the nature of dark matter and dark energy.
Weak gravitational lensing of background galaxies provides a direct probe of the projected matter distribution in and around galaxy clusters. Here we present a self-contained pedagogical review of cluster--galaxy weak lensing, covering a range of topics relevant to its cosmological and astrophysical applications. We begin by reviewing the theoretical foundations of gravitational lensing from first principles, with special attention to the basics and advanced techniques of weak gravitational lensing. We summarize and discuss key findings from recent cluster--galaxy weak-lensing studies on both observational and theoretical grounds, with a focus on cluster mass profiles, the concentration--mass relation, the splashback radius, and implications from extensive mass calibration efforts for cluster cosmology.
In recent years, the amplitude of matter fluctuations inferred from low-redshift probes has been found to be generally lower than the value derived from CMB observations in the $Lambda$CDM model. This tension has been exemplified by Sunyaev-Zeldovich and X-ray cluster counts which, when using their Planck standard cluster mass calibration, yield a value of $sigma_8$ , appreciably lower than estimations based on the latest Planck CMB measurements. In this work we examine whether non-minimal neutrino masses can alleviate this tension substantially. We used the cluster X-ray temperature distribution function derived from a flux-limited sample of local X-ray clusters, combined with Planck CMB measurements. These datasets were compared to $Lambda$CDM predictions based on recent mass function, adapted to account for the effects of massive neutrinos. Treating the clusters mass calibration as a free parameter, we examined whether the data favours neutrino masses appreciably higher than the minimal 0.06 eV value. Using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods, we found no significant correlation between the mass calibration of clusters and the sum of neutrino masses, meaning that massive neutrinos do not noticeably alleviate the above-mentioned Planck CMB--clusters tension. The addition of other datasets (BAO and Ly-$alpha$) reinforces those conclusions. As an alternative possible solution to the tension, we introduced a simple, phenomenological modification of gravity by letting the growth index $gamma$ vary as an additional free parameter. We find that the cluster mass calibration is robustly correlated with the $gamma$ parameter, insensitively to the presence of massive neutrinos or/and additional data used. We conclude that the standard Planck mass calibration of clusters, if consolidated, would represent evidence for new physics beyond $Lambda$CDM with massive neutrinos.