Dark Energy Survey Year 1 results: the impact of galaxy neighbours on weak lensing cosmology with IM3SHAPE

We use a suite of simulated images based on Year 1 of the Dark Energy Survey to explore the impact of galaxy neighbours on shape measurement and shear cosmology. The HOOPOE image simulations include realistic blending, galaxy positions, and spatial variations in depth and point spread function properties. Using the IM3SHAPE maximum-likelihood shape measurement code, we identify four mechanisms by which neighbours can have a non-negligible influence on shear estimation. These effects, if ignored, would contribute a net multiplicative bias of m ∼ 0.03–0.09 in the Year One of the Dark Energy Survey (DES Y1) IM3SHAPE catalogue, though the precise impact will be dependent on both the measurement code and the selection cuts applied. This can be reduced to percentage level or less by removing objects with close neighbours, at a cost to the effective number density of galaxies neff of 30 per cent. We use the cosmological inference pipeline of DES Y1 to explore the cosmological implications of neighbour bias and show that omitting blending from the calibration simulation for DES Y1 would bias the inferred clustering amplitude S8 ≡ σ8(Ωm/0.3)0.5 by 2σ towards low values. Finally, we use the HOOPOE simulations to test the effect of neighbour-induced spatial correlations in the multiplicative bias. We find the impact on the recovered S8 of ignoring such correlations to be subdominant to statistical error at the current level of precision

Dark Energy Survey Year 3 results: cosmology from cosmic shear and robustness to data calibration

This work, together with its companion paper, Secco, Samuroff et al. [Phys. Rev. D 105, 023515 (2022)PRVDAQ2470-001010.1103/PhysRevD.105.023515], present the Dark Energy Survey Year 3 cosmic-shear measurements and cosmological constraints based on an analysis of over 100 million source galaxies. With the data spanning 4143 deg2 on the sky, divided into four redshift bins, we produce a measurement with a signal-to-noise of 40. We conduct a blind analysis in the context of the Lambda-Cold Dark Matter (ΛCDM) model and find a 3% constraint of the clustering amplitude, S8σ8(ωm/0.3)0.5=0.759-0.023+0.025. A ΛCDM-Optimized analysis, which safely includes smaller scale information, yields a 2% precision measurement of S8=0.772-0.017+0.018 that is consistent with the fiducial case. The two low-redshift measurements are statistically consistent with the Planck Cosmic Microwave Background result, however, both recovered S8 values are lower than the high-redshift prediction by 2.3σ and 2.1σ (p-values of 0.02 and 0.05), respectively. The measurements are shown to be internally consistent across redshift bins, angular scales and correlation functions. The analysis is demonstrated to be robust to calibration systematics, with the S8 posterior consistent when varying the choice of redshift calibration sample, the modeling of redshift uncertainty and methodology. Similarly, we find that the corrections included to account for the blending of galaxies shifts our best-fit S8 by 0.5σ without incurring a substantial increase in uncertainty. We examine the limiting factors for the precision of the cosmological constraints and find observational systematics to be subdominant to the modeling of astrophysics. Specifically, we identify the uncertainties in modeling baryonic effects and intrinsic alignments as the limiting systematics

Dark Energy Survey Year 3 results: cosmology from cosmic shear and robustness to modeling uncertainty

This work and its companion paper, Amon et al. [Phys. Rev. D 105, 023514 (2022)PRVDAQ2470-001010.1103/PhysRevD.105.023514], present cosmic shear measurements and cosmological constraints from over 100 million source galaxies in the Dark Energy Survey (DES) Year 3 data. We constrain the lensing amplitude parameter S8σ8ωm/0.3 at the 3% level in ΛCDM: S8=0.759-0.023+0.025 (68% CL). Our constraint is at the 2% level when using angular scale cuts that are optimized for the ΛCDM analysis: S8=0.772-0.017+0.018 (68% CL). With cosmic shear alone, we find no statistically significant constraint on the dark energy equation-of-state parameter at our present statistical power. We carry out our analysis blind, and compare our measurement with constraints from two other contemporary weak lensing experiments: the Kilo-Degree Survey (KiDS) and Hyper-Suprime Camera Subaru Strategic Program (HSC). We additionally quantify the agreement between our data and external constraints from the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). Our DES Y3 result under the assumption of ΛCDM is found to be in statistical agreement with Planck 2018, although favors a lower S8 than the CMB-inferred value by 2.3σ (a p-value of 0.02). This paper explores the robustness of these cosmic shear results to modeling of intrinsic alignments, the matter power spectrum and baryonic physics. We additionally explore the statistical preference of our data for intrinsic alignment models of different complexity. The fiducial cosmic shear model is tested using synthetic data, and we report no biases greater than 0.3σ in the plane of S8×ωm caused by uncertainties in the theoretical models

Dark energy survey year 1 results: the relationship between mass and light around cosmic voids

What are the mass and galaxy profiles of cosmic voids? In this paper, we use two methods to extract voids in the Dark Energy Survey (DES) Year 1 redMaGiC galaxy sample to address this question. We use either 2D slices in projection, or the 3D distribution of galaxies based on photometric redshifts to identify voids. For the mass profile, we measure the tangential shear profiles of background galaxies to infer the excess surface mass density. The signal-to-noise ratio for our lensing measurement ranges between 10.7 and 14.0 for the two void samples. We infer their 3D density profiles by fitting models based on N-body simulations and find good agreement for void radii in the range 15–85 Mpc. Comparison with their galaxy profiles then allows us to test the relation between mass and light at the 10 per cent level, the most stringent test to date. We find very similar shapes for the two profiles, consistent with a linear relationship between mass and light both within and outside the void radius. We validate our analysis with the help of simulated mock catalogues and estimate the impact of photometric redshift uncertainties on the measurement. Our methodology can be used for cosmological applications, including tests of gravity with voids. This is especially promising when the lensing profiles are combined with spectroscopic measurements of void dynamics via redshift-space distortions

Detection of cross-correlation between gravitational lensing and gamma rays

International audienceIn recent years, many γ-ray sources have been identified, yet the unresolved component hosts valuable information on the faintest emission. In order to extract it, a cross-correlation with gravitational tracers of matter in the Universe has been shown to be a promising tool. We report here the first identification of a cross-correlation signal between γ rays and the distribution of mass in the Universe probed by weak gravitational lensing. We use data from the Dark Energy Survey Y1 weak lensing data and the Fermi Large Area Telescope 9-yr γ-ray data, obtaining a signal-to-noise ratio of 5.3. The signal is mostly localized at small angular scales and high γ-ray energies, with a hint of correlation at extended separation. Blazar emission is likely the origin of the small-scale effect. We investigate implications of the large-scale component in terms of astrophysical sources and particle dark matter emission