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Register a new userCosmological Information in Weak Lensing Peaks
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Xiuyuan Yang
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Recent studies have shown that the number counts of convergence peaks N(kappa) in weak lensing (WL) maps, expected from large forthcoming surveys, can be a useful probe of cosmology. We follow up on this finding, and use a suite of WL convergence maps, obtained from ray-tracing N-body simulations, to study (i) the physical origin of WL peaks with different heights, and (ii) whether the peaks contain information beyond the convergence power spectrum P_ell. In agreement with earlier work, we find that high peaks (with amplitudes >~ 3.5 sigma, where sigma is the r.m.s. of the convergence kappa) are typically dominated by a single massive halo. In contrast, medium-height peaks (~0.5-1.5 sigma) cannot be attributed to a single collapsed dark matter halo, and are instead created by the projection of multiple (typically, 4-8) halos along the line of sight, and by random galaxy shape noise. Nevertheless, these peaks dominate the sensitivity to the cosmological parameters w, sigma_8, and Omega_m. We find that the peak height distribution and its dependence on cosmology differ significantly from predictions in a Gaussian random field. We directly compute the marginalized errors on w, sigma_8, and Omega_m from the N(kappa) + P_ell combination, including redshift tomography with source galaxies at z_s=1 and z_s=2. We find that the N(kappa) + P_ell combination has approximately twice the cosmological sensitivity compared to P_ell alone. These results demonstrate that N(kappa) contains non-Gaussian information complementary to the power spectrum.
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In order to extract full cosmological information from next-generation large and high-precision weak lensing (WL) surveys (e.g. Euclid, Roman, LSST), higher-order statistics that probe the small-scale, non-linear regime of large scale structure (LSS) need to be utilized. WL peak counts, which trace overdensities in the cosmic web, are one promising and simple statistic for constraining cosmological parameters. The physical origin of WL peaks have previously been linked to dark matter halos along the line of sight and this peak-halo connection has been used to develop various semi-analytic halo-based models for predicting peak counts. Here, we study the origin of WL peaks and the effectiveness of halo-based models for WL peak counts using a suite of ray-tracing N-body simulations. We compare WL peaks in convergence maps from the full simulations to those in maps created from only particles associated with halos -- the latter playing the role of a perfect halo model. We find that while halo-only contributions are able to replicate peak counts qualitatively well, halos do not explain all WL peaks. Halos particularly underpredict negative peaks, which are associated with local overdensities in large-scale underdense regions along the line of sight. In addition, neglecting non-halo contributions to peaks counts leads to a significant bias on the parameters ($Omega_{rm m}$, $sigma_{8}$) for surveys larger than $geq$ 100 deg$^{2}$. We conclude that other elements of the cosmic web, outside and far away from dark matter halos, need to be incorporated into models of WL peaks in order to infer unbiased cosmological constraints.
In this manuscript of the habilitation `a diriger des recherches (HDR), the author presents some of his work over the last ten years. The main topic of this thesis is cosmic shear, the distortion of images of distant galaxies due to weak gravitational lensing by the large-scale structure in the Universe. Cosmic shear has become a powerful probe into the nature of dark matter and the origin of the current accelerated expansion of the Universe. Over the last years, cosmic shear has evolved into a reliable and robust cosmological probe, providing measurements of the expansion history of the Universe and the growth of its structure. I review the principles of weak gravitational lensing and show how cosmic shear is interpreted in a cosmological context. Then I give an overview of weak-lensing measurements, and present observational results from the Canada-France Hawaii Lensing Survey (CFHTLenS), as well as the implications for cosmology. I conclude with an outlook on the various future surveys and missions, for which cosmic shear is one of the main science drivers, and discuss promising new weak cosmological lensing techniques for future observations.
We study the cosmological information of weak lensing (WL) peaks, focusing on two other statistics besides their abundance: the stacked tangential-shear profiles and the peak-peak correlation function. We use a large ensemble of simulated WL maps with survey specifications relevant to future missions like Euclid and LSST, to explore the three peak probes. We find that the correlation function of peaks with high signal-to-noise (S/N) measured from fields of size 144 sq. deg. has a maximum of ~0.3 at an angular scale ~10 arcmin. For peaks with smaller S/N, the amplitude of the correlation function decreases, and its maximum occurs on smaller angular scales. We compare the peak observables measured with and without shape noise and find that for S/N~3 only ~5% of the peaks are due to large-scale structures, the rest being generated by shape noise. The covariance matrix of the probes is examined: the correlation function is only weakly covariant on scales < 30 arcmin, and slightly more on larger scales; the shear profiles are very correlated for theta > 2 arcmin, with a correlation coefficient as high as 0.7. Using the Fisher-matrix formalism, we compute the cosmological constraints for {Om_m, sig_8, w, n_s} considering each probe separately, as well as in combination. We find that the correlation function of peaks and shear profiles yield marginalized errors which are larger by a factor of 2-4 for {Om_m, sig_8} than the errors yielded by the peak abundance alone, while the errors for {w, n_s} are similar. By combining the three probes, the marginalized constraints are tightened by a factor of ~2 compared to the peak abundance alone, the least contributor to the error reduction being the correlation function. This work therefore recommends that future WL surveys use shear peaks beyond their abundance in order to constrain the cosmological model.
We study the statistics of peaks in a weak lensing reconstructed mass map of the first 450 square degrees of the Kilo Degree Survey. The map is computed with aperture masses directly applied to the shear field with an NFW-like compensated filter. We compare the peak statistics in the observations with that of simulations for various cosmologies to constrain the cosmological parameter $S_8 = sigma_8 sqrt{Omega_{rm m}/0.3}$, which probes the ($Omega_{rm m}, sigma_8$) plane perpendicularly to its main degeneracy. We estimate $S_8=0.750pm0.059$, using peaks in the signal-to-noise range $0 leq {rm S/N} leq 4$, and accounting for various systematics, such as multiplicative shear bias, mean redshift bias, baryon feedback, intrinsic alignment, and shear-position coupling. These constraints are $sim25%$ tighter than the constraints from the high significance peaks alone ($3 leq {rm S/N} leq 4$) which typically trace single-massive halos. This demonstrates the gain of information from low-S/N peaks. However we find that including ${rm S/N} < 0$ peaks does not add further information. Our results are in good agreement with the tomographic shear two-point correlation function measurement in KiDS-450. Combining shear peaks with non-tomographic measurements of the shear two-point correlation functions yields a $sim20%$ improvement in the uncertainty on $S_8$ compared to the shear two-point correlation functions alone, highlighting the great potential of peaks as a cosmological probe.
We present the current status of cosmic shear studies and their implications on cosmological models. Theoretical expectations and observational results are discussed in the framework of standard cosmology and CDM scenarios. The potentials of the next generation cosmic shear surveys are discussed.
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