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Register a new userGravitational lens surveys with LOFAR
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Authors
Olaf Wucknitz AIfA
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Deep surveys planned as a Key Science Project of LOFAR provide completely new opportunities for gravitational lens searches. For the first time do large-scale surveys reach the resolution required for a direct selection of lens candidates using morphological criteria. We briefly describe the strategies that we will use to exploit this potential. The long baselines of an international E-LOFAR are essential for this project.
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Strong gravitationally lensed quasars provide powerful means to study galaxy evolution and cosmology. Current and upcoming imaging surveys will contain thousands of new lensed quasars, augmenting the existing sample by at least two orders of magnitude. To find such lens systems, we built a robot, CHITAH, that hunts for lensed quasars by modeling the configuration of the multiple quasar images. Specifically, given an image of an object that might be a lensed quasar, CHITAH first disentangles the light from the supposed lens galaxy and the light from the multiple quasar images based on color information. A simple rule is designed to categorize the given object as a potential four-image (quad) or two-image (double) lensed quasar system. The configuration of the identified quasar images is subsequently modeled to classify whether the object is a lensed quasar system. We test the performance of CHITAH using simulated lens systems based on the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Legacy Survey. For bright quads with large image separations (with Einstein radius $r_{rm ein}>1.1$) simulated using Gaussian point-spread functions, a high true-positive rate (TPR) of $sim$90% and a low false-positive rate of $sim$$3%$ show that this is a promising approach to search for new lens systems. We obtain high TPR for lens systems with $r_{rm ein}gtrsim0.5$, so the performance of CHITAH is set by the seeing. We further feed a known gravitational lens system, COSMOS 5921$+$0638, to CHITAH, and demonstrate that CHITAH is able to classify this real gravitational lens system successfully. Our newly built CHITAH is omnivorous and can hunt in any ground-based imaging surveys.
Radio astronomy is entering the era of large surveys. This paper describes the plans for wide surveys with the LOw Frequency ARray (LOFAR) and their synergy with large surveys at higher frequencies (in particular in the 1-2 GHz band) that will be possible using future facilities like Apertif or ASKAP. The LOFAR Survey Key Science Project aims at conducting large-sky surveys at 15, 30, 60, 120 and 200 MHz taking advantage of the wide instantaneous field of view and of the unprecedented sensitivity of this instrument. Four topics have been identified as drivers for these surveys covering the formation of massive galaxies, clusters and black holes using z>6 radio galaxies as probes, the study of the intercluster magnetic fields using diffuse radio emission and Faraday rotation measures in galaxy clusters as probes and the study of star formation processes in the early Universe using starburst galaxies as probes. The fourth topic is the exploration of new parameter space for serendipitous discovery taking advantage of the new observational spectral window open up by LOFAR. Here, we briefly discuss the requirements of the proposed surveys to address these (and many others!) topics as well as the synergy with other wide area surveys planned at higher frequencies (and in particular in the 1-2 GHz band) with new radio facilities like ASKAP and Apertif. The complementary information provided by these surveys will be crucial for detailed studies of the spectral shape of a variety of radio sources (down to sub-mJy sources) and for studies of the ISM (in particular HI and OH) in nearby galaxies.
Gravitational wave (GW) detections have enriched our understanding of the universe. To date, all single-source GW events were found by interferometer-type detectors. We study a detection method using astrometric solutions from photometric surveys and demonstrate that it offers a highly flexible frequency range, uniquely complementing existing detection methods. From repeated point-source astrometric measurements, we may extract GW-induced deflections and infer wave parameters. This method can be applied to any photometric surveys measuring relative astrometry. We show that high-cadence observations of the galactic bulge, such as offered by the Roman Space Telescopes Exoplanet MicroLensing (EML) survey, can be a potent GW probe with complementary frequency range to Gaia, pulsar timing arrays (PTAs), and the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA). We calculate that the Roman EML survey is sensitive to GWs with frequencies ranging from $7.7times10^{-8}$Hz to $5.6times10^{-4}$Hz, which opens up a unique GW observing window for supermassive black hole binaries and their waveform evolution. While the detection threshold assuming the currently expected performance proves too high for detecting individual GWs in light of the expected supermassive black hole binary population distribution, we show that binaries with chirp mass $M_c>10^{8.3}~M_odot$ out to 100 Mpc can be detected if the telescope is able to achieve an astrometric accuracy of 0.11 mas. To confidently detect binaries with $M_c>10^{7}~M_odot$ out to 50 Mpc, a factor of 100 sensitivity improvement is required. We propose several improvement strategies, including recovering the mean astrometric deflection and increasing astrometric accuracy, number of observed stars, field-of-view size, and observational cadence. We discuss how other existing and planned photometric surveys could contribute to detecting GWs via astrometry.
Gravitational microlensing events produced by lenses composed of binary masses are important because they provide a major channel to determine physical parameters of lenses. In this work, we analyze the light curves of two binary-lens events OGLE-2006-BLG-277 and OGLE-2012-BLG-0031 for which the light curves exhibit strong deviations from standard models. From modeling considering various second-order effects, we find that the deviations are mostly explained by the effect of the lens orbital motion. We also find that lens parallax effects can mimic orbital effects to some extent. This implies that modeling light curves of binary-lens events not considering orbital effects can result in lens parallaxes that are substantially different from actual values and thus wrong determinations of physical lens parameters. This demonstrates the importance of routine consideration of orbital effects in interpreting light curves of binary-lens events. It is found that the lens of OGLE-2006-BLG-277 is a binary composed of a low-mass star and a brown dwarf companion.
Strong lensing gravitational time delays are a powerful and cost effective probe of dark energy. Recent studies have shown that a single lens can provide a distance measurement with 6-7 % accuracy (including random and systematic uncertainties), provided sufficient data are available to determine the time delay and reconstruct the gravitational potential of the deflector. Gravitational-time delays are a low redshift (z~0-2) probe and thus allow one to break degeneracies in the interpretation of data from higher-redshift probes like the cosmic microwave background in terms of the dark energy equation of state. Current studies are limited by the size of the sample of known lensed quasars, but this situation is about to change. Even in this decade, wide field imaging surveys are likely to discover thousands of lensed quasars, enabling the targeted study of ~100 of these systems and resulting in substantial gains in the dark energy figure of merit. In the next decade, a further order of magnitude improvement will be possible with the 10000 systems expected to be detected and measured with LSST and Euclid. To fully exploit these gains, we identify three priorities. First, support for the development of software required for the analysis of the data. Second, in this decade, small robotic telescopes (1-4m in diameter) dedicated to monitoring of lensed quasars will transform the field by delivering accurate time delays for ~100 systems. Third, in the 2020s, LSST will deliver 1000s of time delays; the bottleneck will instead be the aquisition and analysis of high resolution imaging follow-up. Thus, the top priority for the next decade is to support fast high resolution imaging capabilities, such as those enabled by the James Webb Space Telescope and next generation adaptive optics systems on large ground based telescopes.
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