Developing analysis pipelines based on statistics beyond two-point functions is critical for extracting a maximal amount of cosmological information from current and upcoming weak lensing surveys. In this paper, we study the impact of the intrinsic a
lignment of galaxies (IA) on three promising probes measured from aperture mass maps -- the lensing peaks, minima and full PDF, in comparison and in combination with the shear two-point correlation functions ($gamma$-2PCFs). Our two-dimensional IA infusion method converts the light-cone-projected mass sheets into projected tidal tensors, which are then linearly coupled to an intrinsic ellipticity component with a strength controlled by the coupling parameter $A_{rm IA}$. We validate our method with the $gamma$-2PCFs statistics, recovering well the analytical calculations from the linear alignment model of citet{BridleKing} in a full tomographic setting, and for different $A_{rm IA}$ values. We next use our method to infuse at the galaxy catalogue level a non-linear IA model that includes the density-weighting term introduced in citet{Blazek2015}, and compute the impact on the three aperture mass map statistics. We find that large snr peaks are maximally affected, with deviations reaching 30% (10%) for a {it Euclid}-like (KiDS-like) survey. Modelling the signal in a $w$CDM cosmology universe with $N$-body simulations, we forecast the cosmological bias caused by unmodelled IA for 100 deg$^2$ of {it Euclid}-like data, finding very large offsets in $w_0$ (5-10$sigma_{rm stat}$), $Omega_{rm m}$ (4-6$sigma_{rm stat}$), and $S_8 equiv sigma_8sqrt{Omega_{rm m}/0.3}$ ($sim$3$sigma_{rm stat}$). The method presented in this paper offers a compelling avenue to account for IA in beyond-two-point weak lensing statistics, with a flexibility comparable to that of current $gamma$-2PCFs IA analytical models.
NonGaussian cosmic shear statistics based on weak-lensing aperture mass ($M_{rm ap}$) maps can outperform the classical shear two-point correlation function ($gamma$-2PCF) in terms of cosmological constraining power. However, reaching the full potent
ial of these new estimators requires accurate modeling of the physics of baryons as the extra nonGaussian information mostly resides at small scales. We present one such modeling based on the Magneticum hydrodynamical simulation for the KiDS-450 and DES-Y1 surveys and a Euclid-like survey. We compute the bias due to baryons on the lensing PDF and the distribution of peaks and voids in $M_{rm ap}$ maps and propagate it to the cosmological forecasts on the structure growth parameter $S_8$, the matter density parameter $Omega_{rm m}$, and the dark energy equation of state $w_0$ using the SLICS and cosmo-SLICS sets of dark-matter-only simulations. We report a negative bias of a few percent on $S_8$ and $Omega_{rm m}$ and also measure a positive bias of the same level on $w_0$ when including a tomographic decomposition. These biases reach $sim 5$% when combining $M_{rm ap}$ statistics with the $gamma$-2PCF as these estimators show similar dependency on the AGN feedback. We verify that these biases constitute a less than $1sigma$ shift on the probed cosmological parameters for current cosmic shear surveys. However, baryons need to be accounted for at the percentage level for future Stage IV surveys and we propose to include the uncertainty on the AGN feedback amplitude by marginalizing over this parameter using multiple simulations such as those presented in this paper. Finally, we explore the possibility of mitigating the impact of baryons by filtering the $M_{rm ap}$ map but find that this process would require to suppress the small-scale information to a point where the constraints would no longer be competitive.
We constrain cosmological parameters from a joint cosmic shear analysis of peak-counts and the two-point shear correlation functions, as measured from the Dark Energy Survey (DES-Y1). We find the structure growth parameter $S_8equiv sigma_8sqrt{Omega
_{rm m}/0.3} = 0.766^{+0.033}_{-0.038}$, which at 4.8% precision, provides one of the tightest constraints on $S_8$ from the DES-Y1 weak lensing data. In our simulation-based method we determine the expected DES-Y1 peak-count signal for a range of cosmologies sampled in four $w$CDM parameters ($Omega_{rm m}$, $sigma_8$, $h$, $w_0$). We also determine the joint covariance matrix with over 1000 realisations at our fiducial cosmology. With mock DES-Y1 data we calibrate the impact of photometric redshift and shear calibration uncertainty on the peak-count, marginalising over these uncertainties in our cosmological analysis. Using dedicated training samples we show that our measurements are unaffected by mass resolution limits in the simulation, and that our constraints are robust against uncertainty in the effect of baryon feedback. Accurate modelling for the impact of intrinsic alignments on the tomographic peak-count remains a challenge, currently limiting our exploitation of cross-correlated peak counts between high and low redshift bins. We demonstrate that once calibrated, a fully tomographic joint peak-count and correlation functions analysis has the potential to reach a 3% precision on $S_8$ for DES-Y1. Our methodology can be adopted to model any statistic that is sensitive to the non-Gaussian information encoded in the shear field. In order to accelerate the development of these beyond-two-point cosmic shear studies, our simulations are made available to the community upon request.
We forecast and optimize the cosmological power of various weak-lensing aperture mass ($M_{rm ap}$) map statistics for future cosmic shear surveys, including peaks, voids, and the full distribution of pixels (1D $M_{rm ap}$). These alternative method
s probe the non-Gaussian regime of the matter distribution, adding complementary cosmological information to the classical two-point estimators. Based on the SLICS and cosmo-SLICS $N$-body simulations, we build Euclid-like mocks to explore the $S_8 - Omega_{rm m} - w_0$ parameter space. We develop a new tomographic formalism which exploits the cross-information between redshift slices (cross-$M_{rm ap}$) in addition to the information from individual slices (auto-$M_{rm ap}$) probed in the standard approach. Our auto-$M_{rm ap}$ forecast precision is in good agreement with the recent literature on weak-lensing peak statistics, and is improved by $sim 50$% when including cross-$M_{rm ap}$. It is further boosted by the use of 1D $M_{rm ap}$ that outperforms all other estimators, including the shear two-point correlation function ($gamma$-2PCF). When considering all tomographic terms, our uncertainty range on the structure growth parameter $S_8$ is enhanced by $sim 45$% (almost twice better) when combining 1D $M_{rm ap}$ and the $gamma$-2PCF compared to the $gamma$-2PCF alone. We additionally measure the first combined forecasts on the dark energy equation of state $w_0$, finding a factor of three reduction of the statistical error compared to the $gamma$-2PCF alone. This demonstrates that the complementary cosmological information explored by non-Gaussian $M_{rm ap}$ map statistics not only offers the potential to improve the constraints on the recent $sigma_8$ - $Omega_{rm m}$ tension, but also constitutes an avenue to understand the accelerated expansion of our Universe.
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.
While our current cosmological model places galaxy clusters at the nodes of a filament network (the cosmic web), we still struggle to detect these filaments at high redshifts. We perform a weak lensing study for a sample of 16 massive, medium-high re
dshift (0.4<z<0.9) galaxy clusters from the DAFT/FADA survey, that are imaged in at least three optical bands with Subaru/Suprime-Cam or CFHT/MegaCam. We estimate the cluster masses using an NFW fit to the shear profile measured in a KSB-like method, adding our contribution to the calibration of the observable-mass relation required for cluster abundance cosmological studies. We compute convergence maps and select structures within, securing their detection with noise re-sampling techniques. Taking advantage of the large field of view of our data, we study cluster environment, adding information from galaxy density maps at the cluster redshift and from X-ray images when available. We find that clusters show a large variety of weak lensing maps at large scales and that they may all be embedded in filamentary structures at megaparsec scale. We classify them in three categories according to the smoothness of their weak lensing contours and to the amount of substructures: relaxed (~7%), past mergers (~21.5%), recent or present mergers (~71.5%). The fraction of clusters undergoing merging events observationally supports the hierarchical scenario of cluster growth, and implies that massive clusters are strongly evolving at the studied redshifts. Finally, we report the detection of unusually elongated structures in CLJ0152, MACSJ0454, MACSJ0717, A851, BMW1226, MACSJ1621, and MS1621.
We compute optical galaxy luminosity functions (GLFs) in the B, V, R, and I rest-frame bands for one of the largest medium-to-high-redshift (0.4 < z < 0.9) cluster samples to date in order to probe the abundance of faint galaxies in clusters. We also
study how the GLFs depend on cluster redshift, mass, and substructure, and compare the GLFs of clusters with those of the field. We separately investigate the GLFs of blue and red-sequence (RS) galaxies to understand the evolution of different cluster populations. We find that the shapes of our GLFs are similar for the B, V, R, and I bands with a drop at the red GLF faint end that is more pronounced at high-redshift: alpha(red) ~ -0.5 at 0.40 < z < 0.65 and alpha(red) > 0.1 at 0.65 < z < 0.90. The blue GLFs have a steeper faint end (alpha(blue) ~ -1.6) than the red GLFs, that appears to be independent of redshift. For the full cluster sample, blue and red GLFs intersect at M(V) = -20, M(R) = -20.5, and M(I) = -20.3. A study of how galaxy types evolve with redshift shows that late type galaxies appear to become early types between z ~ 0.9 and today. Finally, the faint ends of the red GLFs of more massive clusters appear to be richer than less massive clusters, which is more typical of the lower redshift behaviour. Our results indicate that our clusters form at redshifts higher than z = 0.9 from galaxy structures that already have an established red sequence. Late type galaxies then appear to evolve into early types, enriching the red-sequence between this redshift and today. This effect is consistent with the evolution of the faint end slope of the red-sequence and the galaxy type evolution that we find. Finally, faint galaxies accreted from the field environment at all redshifts might have replaced the blue late type galaxies that converted into early types, explaining the lack of evolution in the faint end slopes of the blue GLFs.
