Weak Lensing Publications

Distinguishing standard and modified gravity cosmologies with machine learning

Posted on November 6, 2018November 6, 2018 by Austin Peel

Abstract

We present a convolutional neural network to identify distinct cosmological scenarios based on the weak-lensing maps they produce. Modified gravity models with massive neutrinos can mimic the standard concordance model in terms of Gaussian weak-lensing observables, limiting a deeper understanding of what causes cosmic acceleration. We demonstrate that a network trained on simulated clean convergence maps, condensed into a novel representation, can discriminate between such degenerate models with 83%-100% accuracy. Our method outperforms conventional statistics by up to 40% and is more robust to noise.

On the dissection of degenerate cosmologies with machine learning

Posted on November 6, 2018November 11, 2018 by Austin Peel

Abstract

Based on the DUSTGRAIN-pathfinder suite of simulations, we investigate observational degeneracies between nine models of modified gravity and massive neutrinos. Three types of machine learning techniques are tested for their ability to discriminate lensing convergence maps by extracting dimensional reduced representations of the data. Classical map descriptors such as the power spectrum, peak counts and Minkowski functionals are combined into a joint feature vector and compared to the descriptors and statistics that are common to the field of digital image processing. To learn new features directly from the data we use a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). For the mapping between feature vectors and the predictions of their underlying model, we implement two different classifiers; one based on a nearest-neighbour search and one that is based on a fully connected neural network. We find that the neural network provides a much more robust classification than the nearest-neighbour approach and that the CNN provides the most discriminating representation of the data. It achieves the cleanest separation between the different models and the highest classification success rate of 59% for a single source redshift. Once we perform a tomographic CNN analysis, the total classification accuracy increases significantly to 76% with no observational degeneracies remaining. Visualising the filter responses of the CNN at different network depths provides us with the unique opportunity to learn from very complex models and to understand better why they perform so well.

Cosmological parameters from weak cosmological lensing

Posted on July 1, 2018November 10, 2018 by Martin Kilbinger

Abstract

In this manuscript of the habilitation à 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 Hawai'i 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.

A highly precise shape-noise-free shear bias estimator

Posted on June 28, 2018November 10, 2018 by Arnau Pujol

Abstract

We present a new method to estimate shear measurement bias in image simulations that significantly improves its precision with respect to the state-of-the-art methods. This method is based on measuring the shear response for individual images. We generate sheared versions of the same image to measure how the shape measurement changes with the changes in the shear, so that we obtain a shear response for each original image, as well as its additive bias. Using the exact same noise realizations for each sheared version allows us to obtain an exact estimation of its shear response. The estimated shear bias of a sample of galaxies comes from the measured averages of the shear response and individual additive bias. The precision of this method supposes an improvement with respect to previous methods since our method is not affected by shape noise. As a consequence, the method does not require shape noise cancellation for a precise estimation of shear bias. The method can be easily applied to many applications such as shear measurement validation and calibration, reducing the number of necessary simulated images by a few orders of magnitude to achieve the same precision requirements.

Breaking degeneracies in modified gravity with higher (than 2nd) order weak-lensing statistics

Posted on May 16, 2018November 12, 2018 by Austin Peel

Abstract

General relativity (GR) has been well tested up to solar system scales, but it is much less certain that standard gravity remains an accurate description on the largest, that is, cosmological, scales. Many extensions to GR have been studied that are not yet ruled out by the data, including by that of the recent direct gravitational wave detections. Degeneracies among the standard model (ΛCDM) and modified gravity (MG) models, as well as among different MG parameters, must be addressed in order to best exploit information from current and future surveys and to unveil the nature of dark energy. We propose various higher-order statistics in the weak-lensing signal as a new set of observables able to break degeneracies between massive neutrinos and MG parameters. We have tested our methodology on so-called f(R) models, which constitute a class of viable models that can explain the accelerated universal expansion by a modification of the fundamental gravitational interaction. We have explored a range of these models that still fit current observations at the background and linear level, and we show using numerical simulations that certain models which include massive neutrinos are able to mimic ΛCDM in terms of the 3D power spectrum of matter density fluctuations. We find that depending on the redshift and angular scale of observation, non-Gaussian information accessed by higher-order weak-lensing statistics can be used to break the degeneracy between f(R) models and ΛCDM. In particular, peak counts computed in aperture mass maps outperform third- and fourth-order moments.

Improving Weak Lensing Mass Map Reconstructions using Gaussian and Sparsity Priors: Application to DES SV

Posted on January 30, 2018October 25, 2018 by Jean-Luc Starck

Abstract

Mapping the underlying density field, including non-visible dark matter, using weak gravitational lensing measurements is now a standard tool in cosmology. Due to its importance to the science results of current and upcoming surveys, the quality of the convergence reconstruction methods should be well understood. We compare three different mass map reconstruction methods: Kaiser-Squires (KS), Wiener filter, and GLIMPSE. KS is a direct inversion method, taking no account of survey masks or noise. The Wiener filter is well motivated for Gaussian density fields in a Bayesian framework. The GLIMPSE method uses sparsity, with the aim of reconstructing non-linearities in the density field. We compare these methods with a series of tests on the public Dark Energy Survey (DES) Science Verification (SV) data and on realistic DES simulations. The Wiener filter and GLIMPSE methods offer substantial improvement on the standard smoothed KS with a range of metrics. For both the Wiener filter and GLIMPSE convergence reconstructions we present a 12% improvement in Pearson correlation with the underlying truth from simulations. To compare the mapping methods' abilities to find mass peaks, we measure the difference between peak counts from simulated {\Lambda}CDM shear catalogues and catalogues with no mass fluctuations. This is a standard data vector when inferring cosmology from peak statistics. The maximum signal-to-noise value of these peak statistic data vectors was increased by a factor of 3.5 for the Wiener filter and by a factor of 9 using GLIMPSE. With simulations we measure the reconstruction of the harmonic phases, showing that the concentration of the phase residuals is improved 17% by GLIMPSE and 18% by the Wiener filter. We show that the correlation between the reconstructions from data and the foreground redMaPPer clusters is increased 18% by the Wiener filter and 32% by GLIMPSE.

The Dark Energy Survey Data Release 1

Posted on January 11, 2018January 11, 2018 by Arnau Pujol

Abstract

We describe the first public data release of the Dark Energy Survey, DES DR1, consisting of reduced single epoch images, coadded images, coadded source catalogs, and associated products and services assembled over the first three years of DES science operations. DES DR1 is based on optical/near-infrared imaging from 345 distinct nights (August 2013 to February 2016) by the Dark Energy Camera mounted on the 4-m Blanco telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. We release data from the DES wide-area survey covering ~5,000 sq. deg. of the southern Galactic cap in five broad photometric bands, grizY. DES DR1 has a median delivered point-spread function of g = 1.12, r = 0.96, i = 0.88, z = 0.84, and Y = 0.90 arcsec FWHM, a photometric precision of < 1% in all bands, and an astrometric precision of 151 mas. The median coadded catalog depth for a 1.95" diameter aperture at S/N = 10 is g = 24.33, r = 24.08, i = 23.44, z = 22.69, and Y = 21.44 mag. DES DR1 includes nearly 400M distinct astronomical objects detected in ~10,000 coadd tiles of size 0.534 sq. deg. produced from ~39,000 individual exposures. Benchmark galaxy and stellar samples contain ~310M and ~ 80M objects, respectively, following a basic object quality selection. These data are accessible through a range of interfaces, including query web clients, image cutout servers, jupyter notebooks, and an interactive coadd image visualization tool. DES DR1 constitutes the largest photometric data set to date at the achieved depth and photometric precision.

Dark Energy Survey Year 1 Results: Cosmological Constraints from Galaxy Clustering and Weak Lensing

Posted on August 25, 2017November 23, 2017 by Arnau Pujol

Abstract

We present cosmological results from a combined analysis of galaxy clustering and weak gravitational lensing, using 1321 deg$^2$ of $griz$ imaging data from the first year of the Dark Energy Survey (DES Y1). We combine three two-point functions: (i) the cosmic shear correlation function of 26 million source galaxies in four redshift bins, (ii) the galaxy angular autocorrelation function of 650,000 luminous red galaxies in five redshift bins, and (iii) the galaxy-shear cross-correlation of luminous red galaxy positions and source galaxy shears. To demonstrate the robustness of these results, we use independent pairs of galaxy shape, photometric redshift estimation and validation, and likelihood analysis pipelines. To prevent confirmation bias, the bulk of the analysis was carried out while blind to the true results; we describe an extensive suite of systematics checks performed and passed during this blinded phase. The data are modeled in flat $\Lambda$CDM and $w$CDM cosmologies, marginalizing over 20 nuisance parameters, varying 6 (for $\Lambda$CDM) or 7 (for $w$CDM) cosmological parameters including the neutrino mass density and including the 457 $\times$ 457 element analytic covariance matrix. We find consistent cosmological results from these three two-point functions, and from their combination obtain $S_8 \equiv \sigma_8 (\Omega_m/0.3)^{0.5} = 0.783^{+0.021}_{-0.025}$ and $\Omega_m = 0.264^{+0.032}_{-0.019}$ for $\Lambda$CDM for $w$CDM, we find $S_8 = 0.794^{+0.029}_{-0.027}$, $\Omega_m = 0.279^{+0.043}_{-0.022}$, and $w=-0.80^{+0.20}_{-0.22}$ at 68% CL. The precision of these DES Y1 results rivals that from the Planck cosmic microwave background measurements, allowing a comparison of structure in the very early and late Universe on equal terms. Although the DES Y1 best-fit values for $S_8$ and $\Omega_m$ are lower than the central values from Planck ...

Dark Energy Survey Year 1 Results: Curved-Sky Weak Lensing Mass Map

Posted on August 25, 2017November 23, 2017 by Arnau Pujol

Abstract

We construct the largest curved-sky galaxy weak lensing mass map to date from the DES first-year (DES Y1) data. The map, about 10 times larger than previous work, is constructed over a contiguous $\approx1,500 $deg$^2$, covering a comoving volume of $\approx10 $Gpc$^3$. The effects of masking, sampling, and noise are tested using simulations. We generate weak lensing maps from two DES Y1 shear catalogs, Metacalibration and Im3shape, with sources at redshift $0.2<z<1.3,$ and in each of four bins in this range. In the highest signal-to-noise map, the ratio between the mean signal-to-noise in the E-mode and the B-mode map is $\sim$1.5 ($\sim$2) when smoothed with a Gaussian filter of $\sigma_{G}=30$ (80) arcminutes. The second and third moments of the convergence $\kappa$ in the maps are in agreement with simulations. We also find no significant correlation of $\kappa$ with maps of potential systematic contaminants. Finally, we demonstrate two applications of the mass maps: (1) cross-correlation with different foreground tracers of mass and (2) exploration of the largest peaks and voids in the maps.

Sparse reconstruction of the merging A520 cluster system

Posted on August 3, 2017October 17, 2018 by Austin Peel

Abstract

Merging galaxy clusters present a unique opportunity to study the properties of dark matter in an astrophysical context. These are rare and extreme cosmic events in which the bulk of the baryonic matter becomes displaced from the dark matter halos of the colliding subclusters. Since all mass bends light, weak gravitational lensing is a primary tool to study the total mass distribution in such systems. Combined with X-ray and optical analyses, mass maps of cluster mergers reconstructed from weak-lensing observations have been used to constrain the self-interaction cross-section of dark matter. The dynamically complex Abell 520 (A520) cluster is an exceptional case, even among merging systems: multi-wavelength observations have revealed a surprising high mass-to-light concentration of dark mass, the interpretation of which is difficult under the standard assumption of effectively collisionless dark matter. We revisit A520 using a new sparsity-based mass-mapping algorithm to independently assess the presence of the puzzling dark core. We obtain high-resolution mass reconstructions from two separate galaxy shape catalogs derived from Hubble Space Telescope observations of the system. Our mass maps agree well overall with the results of previous studies, but we find important differences. In particular, although we are able to identify the dark core at a certain level in both data sets, it is at much lower significance than has been reported before using the same data. As we cannot confirm the detection in our analysis, we do not consider A520 as posing a significant challenge to the collisionless dark matter scenario.

Authors:	A. Peel, F. Lalande, J.-L. Starck, V. Pettorino, J. Merten, C. Giocoli, M. Meneghetti, M. Baldi
Journal:	Submitted to PRL
Year:	2018
Download:	ADS \| arXiv

Authors:	J. Merten, C. Giocoli, M. Baldi, M. Meneghetti, A. Peel, F. Lalande, J.-L. Starck, V. Pettorino
Journal:	Submitted to MNRAS
Year:	2018
Download:	ADS \| arXiv

Authors:	M. Kilbinger
Journal:
Year:	07/2018
Download:	ADS\| Arxiv

Authors:	A. Pujol, M. Kilbinger, F. Sureau & J. Bobin
Journal:
Year:	06/2018
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Authors:	A. Peel, V. Pettorino, C. Giocoli, J.-L. Starck, M. Baldi
Journal:	A&A
Year:	2018
Download:	ADS \| arXiv

Authors:	N. Jeffrey, F. B. Abdalla, O. Lahav, F. Lanusse, J.-L. Starck, et al
Journal:
Year:	01/2018
Download:	ADS\| Arxiv

Authors:	DES Collaboration
Journal:
Year:	01/2018
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Authors:	C. Chang, A. Pujol, B. Mawdsley et al.
Journal:
Year:	08/2017
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Authors:	A. Peel, F. Lanusse, J.-L. Starck
Journal:	ApJ
Year:	08/2017
Download:	ADS\| Arxiv