VENUS: Strong Lens Mass Models and Einstein Radii of 60 Galaxy Clusters

Abstract

We present the strong lens mass modeling result of 60 galaxy clusters targeted by Vast Exploration for Nascent, Unexplored Sources (VENUS), the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) multi-epoch Treasury program. We obtain refined mass models for the 60 clusters with the glafic software by fitting positions of $\sim 4500$ multiple images, $\sim 1150$ of which are newly identified multiple images with help of multi-band JWST images. Each cluster contains typically $\sim 50$ multiple images, thanks to the selection of target clusters based on their high lensing strengths. We validate our models with the Jackknife method. The median Einstein radius is $\sim 30''$ and the distribution of the Einstein radii extends out to $\sim 60''$ for the source redshift of 9, which confirms that their lensing strengths are indeed among the highest known to date. For the source redshift of 9, we identify MACS J0717.5+3745, MACS J0600.1$-$2008, and PLCK G287.0+32.9 as clusters with the largest Einstein radii as well as the largest areas of the high-magnification ($|μ|>10$) regions. We find that the observed Einstein radii of VENUS clusters are fully compatible with the standard cold dark matter model.