252 research outputs found
Searching for electromagnetic counterpart of LIGO gravitational waves in the Fermi GBM data with ADWO
The Fermi collaboration identified a possible electromagnetic counterpart of
the gravitational wave event of September 14, 2015. Our goal is to provide an
unsupervised data analysis algorithm to identify similar events in Fermi's
Gamma-ray Burst Monitor CTTE data stream. We are looking for signals that are
typically weak. Therefore, they can only be found by a careful analysis of
count rates of all detectors and energy channels simultaneously. Our
Automatized Detector Weight Optimization (ADWO) method consists of a search for
the signal, and a test of its significance. We developed ADWO, a virtual
detector analysis tool for multi-channel multi-detector signals, and performed
successful searches for short transients in the data-streams. We have
identified GRB150522B, as well as possible electromagnetic candidates of the
transients GW150914 and LVT151012. ADWO is an independently developed,
unsupervised data analysis tool that only relies on the raw data of the Fermi
satellite. It can therefore provide a strong, independent test to any
electromagnetic signal accompanying future gravitational wave observations.Comment: 4 pages and 4 figures, A&A Letters accepte
The size distribution of galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
abridged: We use a complete sample of about 140,000 galaxies from the Sloan
Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to study the size distribution of galaxies and its
dependence on their luminosity, stellar mass, and morphological type. The large
SDSS database provides statistics of unprecedented accuracy. For each type of
galaxy, the size distribution at given luminosity (or stellar mass) is well
described by a log-normal function, characterized by its median and
dispersion . For late-type galaxies, there is a characteristic
luminosity at (assuming ) corresponding to a stellar
mass M_0\sim 10^{10.6}\Msun. Galaxies more massive than have
and , while less massive
galaxies have and . For
early-type galaxies, the - relation is significantly steeper,
, but the - relation is similar
to that of late-type galaxies. Faint red galaxies have sizes quite independent
of their luminosities.Comment: 42 pages, 18 figures, 2 tables; replaced with the version accepted by
MNRA
Spectral Templates from Multicolor Redshift Surveys
Understanding how the physical properties of galaxies (e.g. their spectral
type or age) evolve as a function of redshift relies on having an accurate
representation of galaxy spectral energy distributions. While it has been known
for some time that galaxy spectra can be reconstructed from a handful of
orthogonal basis templates, the underlying basis is poorly constrained. The
limiting factor has been the lack of large samples of galaxies (covering a wide
range in spectral type) with high signal-to-noise spectrophotometric
observations. To alleviate this problem we introduce here a new technique for
reconstructing galaxy spectral energy distributions directly from samples of
galaxies with broadband photometric data and spectroscopic redshifts.
Exploiting the statistical approach of the Karhunen-Loeve expansion, our
iterative training procedure increasingly improves the eigenbasis, so that it
provides better agreement with the photometry. We demonstrate the utility of
this approach by applying these improved spectral energy distributions to the
estimation of photometric redshifts for the HDF sample of galaxies. We find
that in a small number of iterations the dispersion in the photometric
redshifts estimator (a comparison between predicted and measured redshifts) can
decrease by up to a factor of 2.Comment: 25 pages, 9 figures, LaTeX AASTeX, accepted for publication in A
Communication in networks with hierarchical branching
We present a simple model of communication in networks with hierarchical
branching. We analyze the behavior of the model from the viewpoint of critical
systems under different situations. For certain values of the parameters, a
continuous phase transition between a sparse and a congested regime is observed
and accurately described by an order parameter and the power spectra. At the
critical point the behavior of the model is totally independent of the number
of hierarchical levels. Also scaling properties are observed when the size of
the system varies. The presence of noise in the communication is shown to break
the transition. Despite the simplicity of the model, the analytical results are
a useful guide to forecast the main features of real networks.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. Final version accepted in PR
Dynamical Confirmation of SDSS Weak Lensing Scaling Laws
Galaxy masses can be estimated by a variety of methods; each applicable in
different circumstances, and each suffering from different systematic
uncertainties. Confirmation of results obtained by one technique with analysis
by another is particularly important. Recent SDSS weak lensing measurements of
the projected-mass correlation function reveal a linear relation between galaxy
luminosities and the depth of their dark matter halos (measured on 260 \hinv
kpc scales). In this work we use an entirely independent dynamical method to
confirm these results. We begin by assembling a sample of 618 relatively
isolated host galaxies, surrounded by a total of 1225 substantially fainter
satellites. We observe the mean dynamical effect of these hosts on the motions
of their satellites by assembling velocity difference histograms. Dividing the
sample by host properties, we find significant variations in satellite velocity
dispersion with host luminosity. We quantify these variations using a simple
dynamical model, measuring \mtsd a dynamical mass within 260 \hinv kpc. The
appropriateness of this mass reconstruction is checked by conducting a similar
analysis within an N-body simulation. Comparison between the dynamical and
lensing mass-to-light scalings shows reasonable agreement, providing some
quantitative confirmation for the lensing results.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ Letter
Two novel approaches for photometric redshift estimation based on SDSS and 2MASS databases
We investigate two training-set methods: support vector machines (SVMs) and
Kernel Regression (KR) for photometric redshift estimation with the data from
the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 5 and Two Micron All Sky Survey
databases. We probe the performances of SVMs and KR for different input
patterns. Our experiments show that the more parameters considered, the
accuracy doesn't always increase, and only when appropriate parameters chosen,
the accuracy can improve. Moreover for different approaches, the best input
pattern is different. With different parameters as input, the optimal bandwidth
is dissimilar for KR. The rms errors of photometric redshifts based on SVM and
KR methods are less than 0.03 and 0.02, respectively. Finally the strengths and
weaknesses of the two approaches are summarized. Compared to other methods of
estimating photometric redshifts, they show their superiorities, especially KR,
in terms of accuracy.Comment: accepted for publication in ChJA
Fermi GBM transient searches with ADWO
We present the method called Automatized Detector Weight Optimization (ADWO). This method searches for non-triggered, short-duration transients in the data-set of the Fermi's Gamma-ray Burst Monitor. The data of all available detectors and energy channels are combined. Therefore, ADWO is ideal to search for electromagnetic counterparts of gravitational wave events. We present the successful identification of all short-duration gamma-ray bursts, as well as that of the possible electromagnetic counterparts of gravitational wave transients GW150914 and LVT151012
Estimating fixed-frame galaxy magnitudes in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
Broadband measurements of flux for galaxies at different redshifts measure different regions of the rest-frame galaxy spectrum. Certain astronomical questions, such as the evolution of the luminosity function of galaxies, require transforming these inherently redshift-dependent magnitudes into redshift-independent quantities. To prepare to address these astronomical questions, investigated in detail in subsequent papers, we fit spectral energy distributions (SEDs) to broadband photometric observations in the context of the optical observations of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). Linear combinations of four spectral templates can reproduce the five SDSS magnitudes of all galaxies to the precision of the photometry. Expressed in the appropriate coordinate system, the locus of the coefficients multiplying the templates is planar and, in fact, nearly linear. The resulting reconstructed SEDs can be used to recover fixed-frame magnitudes over a range of redshifts. This process yields consistent results in the sense that, within each sample, the intrinsic colors of similar type galaxies are nearly constant with redshift. We compare our results with simpler interpolation methods and galaxy spectrophotometry from the SDSS. The software that generates these results is publicly available and easily adapted to handle a wide range of galaxy observations
The Wyoming Survey for H-alpha. I. Initial Results at z ~ 0.16 and 0.24
The Wyoming Survey for H-alpha, or WySH, is a large-area, ground-based,
narrowband imaging survey for H-alpha-emitting galaxies over the latter half of
the age of the Universe. The survey spans several square degrees in a set of
fields of low Galactic cirrus emission. The observing program focuses on
multiple dz~0.02 epochs from z~0.16 to z~0.81 down to a uniform
(continuum+line) luminosity at each epoch of ~10^33 W uncorrected for
extinction (3sigma for a 3" diameter aperture). First results are presented
here for 98+208 galaxies observed over approximately 2 square degrees at
redshifts z~0.16 and 0.24, including preliminary luminosity functions at these
two epochs. These data clearly show an evolution with lookback time in the
volume-averaged cosmic star formation rate. Integrals of Schechter fits to the
extinction-corrected H-alpha luminosity functions indicate star formation rates
per co-moving volume of 0.009 and 0.014 h_70 M_sun/yr/Mpc^3 at z~0.16 and 0.24,
respectively. The formal uncertainties in the Schechter fits, based on this
initial subset of the survey, correspond to uncertainties in the cosmic star
formation rate density at the >~40% level; the tentative uncertainty due to
cosmic variance is 25%, estimated from separately carrying out the analysis on
data from the first two fields with substantial datasets.Comment: To appear in the Astronomical Journa
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