arXiv subjects

F. Hervas-Peters

Publications and source records attributed to F. Hervas-Peters.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

UNIONS-3500 Weak Lensing: IV. 2D cosmological constraints in harmonic space

The Ultraviolet Near Infrared Optical Northern Survey (UNIONS) is a photometric survey in the northern sky. The quality of the data in the $r$ band provides precise shape measurements to measure the growth of structures using cosmic shear. This work aims to constrain cosmological parameters using a harmonic-space estimator of the cosmic shear signal, known as pseudo-$C_\ell$, in a non-tomographic analysis. We perform our analysis in the context of the standard $\Lambda$CDM cosmology. We model astrophysical systematic effects such as baryonic feedback and intrinsic alignments of galaxies. We verify that the point spread function systematic contribution does not affect our results. We assess the impact of different scale cuts and modelling choices on the constraints. We find $S_8 \equiv \sigma_8 \sqrt{\Omega_{\rm m}/0.3} = 0.891^{+0.057}_{-0.084}$, consistent at the $0.79 \, \sigma$ level with \emph{Planck} and between $0.87$ to $1.51 \, \sigma$ with other weak lensing surveys. Our results are robust to analysis choices, and we use lognormal simulations to assess the consistency between configuration and harmonic space results, finding a $2.18 \, \sigma$ agreement between the two statistics. The degeneracy between $S_8$ and the amplitude of the intrinsic alignment, $A_{\rm IA}$, sampled from a prior obtained from direct measurements, is one of the largest sources of uncertainty. This work is part of the first cosmological analysis of the UNIONS survey using cosmic shear and paves the way for future tomographic and $3 \times 2$ point cross-correlation analyses, exploiting the unique overlap of UNIONS with deep spectroscopic surveys in the northern hemisphere.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2026

UNIONS-3500 Weak Lensing: III. 2D Cosmological Constraints in Configuration Space

We present the first cosmological constraints from the cosmic shear analysis of the UNIONS-3500 weak lensing galaxy catalogue in configuration space. The Ultraviolet Near Infrared Optical Northern Survey (UNIONS) is the largest and deepest photometric survey of the northern hemisphere to date, with the UNIONS-3500 catalogue using high-quality $r$-band imaging across 3500 deg2 of the sky. We perform a 2D cosmic shear analysis with a single tomographic bin, using the two-point correlation function (2PCF) statistic. Assuming a flat LCDM model, we obtain constraints on the clustering amplitude of S_8 = 0.831^{+0.067}_{-0.078}, which is consistent with constraints from Planck CMB measurements and precedent cosmic shear results within 1sigma. We outline the construction of our cosmological inference pipeline, including the estimation of the source redshift distribution, shear calibration, and covariance matrix, and describe methodologies for the mitigation of systematic effects arising from PSF systematics and B-modes. We demonstrate that our results are robust to variations in analysis choices, including scale cuts, prior ranges, and nonlinear modelling. This paper is part of a coordinated release which collectively demonstrates the maturity and readiness of UNIONS to deliver competitive cosmological results, positioning it as a key stepping stone towards the forthcoming era of Stage IV weak lensing experiments.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2026

UNIONS-3500 Weak Lensing: I. A Galaxy Shape Catalogue in the Northern Sky

Weak gravitational lensing has become a widely used effect to characterise the dark-matter distribution on large scales in the Universe by measuring galaxy ellipticities and their statistical correlations. We present the first weak gravitational lensing catalogue for cosmic-shear cosmology of the Ultraviolet Near Infrared Optical Northern Survey (UNIONS). We analyse approximately $3\,500$ square degrees of sky area in the Northern Hemisphere, observed in the $r$-band by MegaCam on the Canada-France Hawai'i Telescope, achieving a median seeing of 0.7 arcsec. Starting from images calibrated for astrometry and photometry, we describe the steps from image processing to catalogue creation. These steps include masking, source detection and selection, star selection, point spread function (PSF) modelling, shape measurement, and calibration. We conduct extensive validation tests, particularly to assess and mitigate the leakage of PSF ellipticity into galaxy shapes. We demonstrate the robustness of the catalogue by investigating correlations between ellipticity and other observational variables as well as structural elements, such as observer-frame image positions and proximity to bright stars. The final galaxy catalogue contains $62$ million galaxies, corresponding to an effective source density of $4.96$ arcmin$^{-2}$. The ellipticity dispersion, commonly referred to as shape noise, is $\sigma_\epsilon = 0.27$. Initiating the first major cosmological analysis by the UNIONS collaboration, this is the first in a series of five papers which cover the various aspects of a robust cosmic shear analysis. Two companion papers discuss the robustness of the catalogue, one through the level of $B$-mode contamination and another by producing and analysing dedicated image simulations for shear calibration, while the other two present cosmological results in real and harmonic space.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2026

UNIONS-3500 Weak Lensing: II. B-mode validation for cosmic shear

At Stage-III sensitivities, cosmic shear $B$ modes unambiguously indicate systematic contamination and are often used to inform data selection and scale cuts for cosmological inference. We validate $B$ modes for the Ultraviolet Near-Infrared Optical Northern Survey (UNIONS)-3500 (2894 deg$^2$, $n_\mathrm{eff} \approx 5.0$ arcmin$^{-2}$) using three $E$/$B$-separable statistics: pure-mode correlation functions $\xi_\pm^{\mathrm{B}}(\theta)$, Complete Orthogonal Sets of $E$/$B$-mode Integrals (COSEBI) $B$-mode amplitudes $B_n$, and harmonic-space power spectra $C_\ell^{BB}$. For each statistic, we compute probability-to-exceed (PTE) values over a two-dimensional grid of scale-cut boundaries; our adopted cuts lie in broad stable regions of acceptable PTE. $B$-mode detections and PTE failures on initial catalog versions led us to investigate galaxy size cuts and stellar halo masking. After cuts, all three statistics pass the null test (minimum PTE $= 0.18$). Before scale cuts, we measure an oscillatory COSEBI $B$-mode pattern consistent with repeating additive shear bias, a detector-level effect seen across multiple Stage-III surveys including CFHTLenS, which used the same MegaCam camera; scale cuts that exclude the charge-coupled device (CCD) angular scale suppress it. Although these statistics probe the same two-point shear field, scale cuts in one do not map exactly onto cuts in another, because their respective filter functions weight angular scales differently. The most conservative validation therefore requires scale and sample selections that pass null tests across all frameworks simultaneously, an approach that applies directly to Stage-IV surveys where systematic errors dominate.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2026

Euclid preparation. Testing analytic models of galaxy intrinsic alignments in the Euclid Flagship simulation

We model intrinsic alignments (IA) in Euclid's Flagship simulation to investigate its impact on Euclid's weak lensing signal. Our IA implementation in the Flagship simulation takes into account photometric properties of galaxies as well as their dark matter host halos. We compare simulations against theory predictions, determining the parameters of two of the most widely used IA models: the Non Linear Alignment (NLA) and the Tidal Alignment and Tidal Torquing (TATT) models. We measure the amplitude of the simulated IA signal as a function of galaxy magnitude and colour in the redshift range $0.1<z<2.1$. We find that both NLA and TATT can accurately describe the IA signal in the simulation down to scales of $6$-$7 \,h^{-1}\,$Mpc. We measure alignment amplitudes for red galaxies comparable to those of the observations, with samples not used in the calibration procedure. For blue galaxies, our constraints are consistent with zero alignments in our first redshift bin $0.1 < z < 0.3$, but we detect a non-negligible signal at higher redshift, which is, however, consistent with the upper limits set by observational constraints. Additionally, several hydrodynamical simulations predict alignment for spiral galaxies, in agreement with our findings. Finally, the evolution of alignment with redshift is realistic and comparable to that determined in the observations. However, we find that the commonly adopted redshift power-law for IA fails to reproduce the simulation alignments above $z=1.1$. A significantly better agreement is obtained when a luminosity dependence is included, capturing the intrinsic luminosity evolution with redshift in magnitude-limited surveys. We conclude that the Flagship IA simulation is a useful tool for translating current IA constraints into predictions for IA contamination of Euclid-like samples.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

Euclid preparation. Sensitivity to non-standard particle dark matter model

The Euclid mission of the European Space Agency will provide weak gravitational lensing and galaxy clustering surveys that can be used to constrain the standard cosmological model and its extensions, with an opportunity to test the properties of dark matter beyond the minimal cold dark matter paradigm. We present forecasts from the combination of these surveys on the parameters describing four interesting and representative non-minimal dark matter models: a mixture of cold and warm dark matter relics; unstable dark matter decaying either into massless or massive relics; and dark matter experiencing feeble interactions with relativistic relics. We model these scenarios at the level of the non-linear matter power spectrum using emulators trained on dedicated N-body simulations. We use a mock Euclid likelihood to fit mock data and infer error bars on dark matter parameters marginalised over other parameters. We find that the Euclid photometric probe (alone or in combination with CMB data from the Planck satellite) will be sensitive to the effect of each of the four dark matter models considered here. The improvement will be particularly spectacular for decaying and interacting dark matter models. With Euclid, the bounds on some dark matter parameters can improve by up to two orders of magnitude compared to current limits. We discuss the dependence of predicted uncertainties on different assumptions: inclusion of photometric galaxy clustering data, minimum angular scale taken into account, modelling of baryonic feedback effects. We conclude that the Euclid mission will be able to measure quantities related to the dark sector of particle physics with unprecedented sensitivity. This will provide important information for model building in high-energy physics. Any hint of a deviation from the minimal cold dark matter paradigm would have profound implications for cosmology and particle physics.

astro-ph.CO↗