arXiv subjects

Francisco Prada

Publications and source records attributed to Francisco Prada.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources

arXiv2024

ELG Spectroscopic Systematics Analysis of the DESI Data Release 1

Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) uses more than 2.4 million Emission Line Galaxies (ELGs) for 3D large-scale structure (LSS) analyses in its Data Release 1 (DR1). Such large statistics enable thorough research on systematic uncertainties. In this study, we focus on spectroscopic systematics of ELGs. The redshift success rate ($f_{\rm goodz}$) is the relative fraction of secure redshifts among all measurements. It depends on observing conditions, thus introduces non-cosmological variations to the LSS. We, therefore, develop the redshift failure weight ($w_{\rm zfail}$) and a per-fibre correction ($η_{\rm zfail}$) to mitigate these dependences. They have minor influences on the galaxy clustering. For ELGs with a secure redshift, there are two subtypes of systematics: 1) catastrophics (large) that only occur in a few samples; 2) redshift uncertainty (small) that exists for all samples. The catastrophics represent 0.26\% of the total DR1 ELGs, composed of the confusion between O\,\textsc{ii} and sky residuals, double objects, total catastrophics and others. We simulate the realistic 0.26\% catastrophics of DR1 ELGs, the hypothetical 1\% catastrophics, and the truncation of the contaminated $1.31<z<1.33$ in the \textsc{AbacusSummit} ELG mocks. Their $P_\ell$ show non-negligible bias from the uncontaminated mocks. But their influences on the redshift space distortions (RSD) parameters are smaller than $0.2σ$. The redshift uncertainty of \Yone ELGs is 8.5 km/s with a Lorentzian profile. The code for implementing the catastrophics and redshift uncertainty on mocks can be found in https://github.com/Jiaxi-Yu/modelling_spectro_sys.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

DESI Massive Post-Starburst Galaxies at $\mathbf{z\sim1.2}$ have compact structures and dense cores

Post-starburst galaxies (PSBs) are young quiescent galaxies that have recently experienced a rapid decrease in star formation, allowing us to probe the fast-quenching period of galaxy evolution. In this work, we obtained HST WFC3/F110W imaging to measure the sizes of 171 massive ($\mathrm{log(M_{*}/M_{\odot})\sim\,11)}$ spectroscopically identified PSBs at $1<z<1.3$ selected from the DESI Survey Validation Luminous Red Galaxy sample. This statistical sample constitutes an order of magnitude increase from the $\sim20$ PSBs with space-based imaging and deep spectroscopy. We perform structural fitting of the target galaxies with \texttt{pysersic} and compare them to quiescent and star-forming galaxies in the 3D-HST survey. We find that these PSBs are more compact than the general population of quiescent galaxies, lying systematically $\mathrm{\sim\,0.1\,dex}$ below the established size-mass relation. However, their central surface mass densities are similar to those of their quiescent counterparts ($\mathrm{\,log(Σ_{1\,kpc}/(M_{\odot}/kpc^2))\sim\,10.1}$). These findings are easily reconciled by later ex-situ growth via minor mergers or a slight progenitor bias. These PSBs are round in projection ($b/a_{median}\sim0.8$), suggesting that they are primarily spheroids, not disks, in 3D. We find no correlation between time since quenching and light-weighted PSB sizes or central densities. This disfavors apparent structural growth due to the fading of centralized starbursts in this galaxy population. Instead, we posit that the fast quenching of massive galaxies at this epoch occurs preferentially in galaxies with pre-existing compact structures.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

The first identification of Lyman $α$ Changing-look Quasars at high-redshift in DESI

We present two cases of Ly$α$ changing-look (CL) quasars (J1306 and J1512) along with two additional candidates (J1511 and J1602), all discovered serendipitously at $z >2$ through the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). It is the first time to capture CL events in Ly$α$ at high redshift, which is crucial for understanding underlying mechanisms driving the CL phenomenon and the evolution of high-redshift quasars and galaxies. The variability of all four sources is confirmed by the significant change of amplitude in the $r$ band ($|r_{\rm DESI}-r_{\rm SDSS}| >0.5 \ \rm mag$). We find that the accretion rate in the dim state for these CL objects corresponds to a relatively low value ($\mathscr{\dot M} \approx 2\times10^{-3}$), which suggests that the inner region of the accretion disk might be in transition between the Advection Dominated Accretion Flow ($\mathscr{\dot M}<10^{-3}\sim 10^{-2}$) and the canonical accretion disk (optically thick, geometrically thin). However, unlike in C {\sc iv} CL quasars in which broad Ly$α$ remained, the broad C {\sc iv} may still persist after a CL event occurs in Ly$α$, making the physical origin of the CL and ionization mechanism event more puzzling and interesting.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Changing-look Active Galactic Nuclei from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument. I.Sample from the Early Data

Changing-look Active Galactic Nuclei (CL AGN) can be generally confirmed by the emergence (turn-on) or disappearance (turn-off) of broad emission lines, associated with a transient timescale (about $100\sim5000$ days) that is much shorter than predicted by traditional accretion disk models. We carry out a systematic CL AGN search by cross-matching the spectra coming from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Following previous studies, we identify CL AGN based on $\rm{H}α$, $\rm{H}β$, and Mg\,{\sc ii} at $z\leq0.75$ and Mg\,{\sc ii}, C\,{\sc iii}], and C\,{\sc iv} at $z>0.75$. We present 130 CL AGN based on visual inspection and three selection criteria, including 2 $\rm{H}α$, 45 $\rm{H}β$, 38 Mg\,{\sc ii}, 61 C\,{\sc iii}], and 10 C\,{\sc iv} CL AGN. Twenty cases show simultaneous appearances/disappearances of two broad emission lines while three AGN exhibit the concurrent appearance of three broad emission lines. We also present 91 CL AGN candidates with significant flux variation of broad emission lines but remaining strong broad components. In the confirmed CL AGN, 42 cases show additional CL candidate features for different lines. In this paper, we find 1) a 95:35 ratio of a turn-on to turn-off CL AGN; 2) the highest redshift CL AGN ($z=3.56$) ever discovered; 3) an upper limit transition timescale ranging from 244 to 5762 days in the rest-frame; 4) the majority of CL AGN follow the bluer-when-brighter trend. Our results greatly increase the current CL census ($30\sim50\%$) and would be conducive to explore the underlying physical mechanism.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

The rate of extreme coronal line emitting galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and their relation to tidal disruption events

High-ionization iron coronal lines (CLs) are a rare phenomenon observed in galaxy and quasi-stellar object spectra that are thought to be created by high-energy emission from active galactic nuclei and certain types of transients. In cases known as extreme coronal line emitting galaxies (ECLEs), these CLs are strong and fade away on a timescale of years. The most likely progenitors of these variable CLs are tidal disruption events (TDEs), which produce sufficient high-energy emission to create and sustain the CLs over these timescales. To test the possible connection between ECLEs and TDEs, we present the most complete variable ECLE rate calculation to date and compare the results to TDE rates from the literature. To achieve this, we search for ECLEs in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). We detect sufficiently strong CLs in 16 galaxies, more than doubling the number previously found in SDSS. We find that none of the nine new ECLEs evolve in a manner consistent with that of the five previously discovered variable ECLEs. Using this sample of five variable ECLEs, we calculate the galaxy-normalized rate of variable ECLEs in SDSS to be $R_\mathrm{G}=3.6~^{+2.6}_{-1.8}~(\mathrm{statistical})~^{+5.1}_{-0.0} (\mathrm{systematic})\times10^{-6}~\mathrm{galaxy}^{-1}~\mathrm{yr}^{-1}$. The mass-normalised rate is $R_\mathrm{M}=3.1~^{+2.3}_{-1.5}~(\mathrm{statistical})~^{+4.4}_{-0.0}~(\mathrm{systematic})\times10^{-17}~\mathrm{M_\odot^{-1}}~\mathrm{yr}^{-1}$ and the volumetric rate is $R_\mathrm{V}=7~^{+20}_{-5}~(\mathrm{statistical})~^{+10}_{-0.0}~(\mathrm{systematic})\times10^{-9}~\mathrm{Mpc}^{-3}~\mathrm{yr}^{-1}$. Our rates are one to two orders of magnitude lower than TDE rates from the literature, which suggests that only 10 to 40 per cent of all TDEs produce variable ECLEs. Additional uncertainties in the rates arising from the structure of the interstellar medium have yet to be included.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2024

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope DR6 and DESI: Structure growth measurements from the cross-correlation of DESI Legacy Imaging galaxies and CMB lensing from ACT DR6 and Planck PR4

We measure the growth of cosmic density fluctuations on large scales and across the redshift range $0.3<z<0.8$ through the cross-correlation of the ACT DR6 CMB lensing map and galaxies from the DESI Legacy Survey, using three galaxy samples spanning the redshifts of $0.3 \lesssim z \lesssim 0.45$, $0.45 \lesssim z \lesssim0.6$, $0.6 \lesssim z \lesssim 0.8$. We adopt a scale cut where non-linear effects are negligible, so that the cosmological constraints are derived from the linear regime. We determine the amplitude of matter fluctuations over all three redshift bins using ACT data alone to be $S_8\equivσ_8(Ω_m/0.3)^{0.5}=0.772\pm0.040$ in a joint analysis combining the three redshift bins and ACT lensing alone. Using a combination of ACT and \textit{Planck} data we obtain $S_8=0.765\pm0.032$. The lowest redshift bin used is the least constraining and exhibits a $\sim2σ$ tension with the other redshift bins; thus we also report constraints excluding the first redshift bin, giving $S_8=0.785\pm0.033$ for the combination of ACT and \textit{Planck}. This result is in excellent agreement at the $0.3σ$ level with measurements from galaxy lensing, but is $1.8σ$ lower than predictions based on \textit{Planck} primary CMB data. Understanding whether this hint of discrepancy in the growth of structure at low redshifts arises from a fluctuation, from systematics in data, or from new physics, is a high priority for forthcoming CMB lensing and galaxy cross-correlation analyses.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

Forward modeling fluctuations in the DESI LRGs target sample using image simulations

We use the forward modeling pipeline, Obiwan, to study the imaging systematics of the Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) targeted by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). We update the Obiwan pipeline, which had previously been developed to simulate the optical images used to target DESI data, to further simulate WISE images in the infrared. This addition makes it possible to simulate the DESI LRGs sample, which utilizes WISE data in the target selection. Deep DESI imaging data combined with a method to account for biases in their shapes is used to define a truth sample of potential LRG targets. We simulate a total of 15 million galaxies to obtain a simulated LRG sample (Obiwan LRGs) that predicts the variations in target density due to imaging properties. We find that the simulations predict the trends with depth observed in the data, including how they depend on the intrinsic brightness of the galaxies. We observe that faint LRGs are the main contributing power of the imaging systematics trend induced by depth. We also find significant trends in the data against Galactic extinction that are not predicted by Obiwan. These trends depend strongly on the particular map of Galactic extinction chosen to test against, implying Large-Scale Structure systematic contamination (e.g. Cosmic-Infrared Background) in the Galactic extinction maps is a likely root cause. We additionally observe that the DESI LRGs sample exhibits a complex dependency on a combination of seeing, depth, and intrinsic galaxy brightness, which is not replicated by Obiwan, suggesting discrepancies between the current simulation settings and the actual observations. The detailed findings we present should be used to guide any observational systematics mitigation treatment for the clustering of the DESI LRG sample.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

Detection of the large-scale tidal field with galaxy multiplet alignment in the DESI Y1 spectroscopic survey

We explore correlations between the orientations of small galaxy groups, or "multiplets", and the large-scale gravitational tidal field. Using data from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Y1 survey, we detect the intrinsic alignment (IA) of multiplets to the galaxy-traced matter field out to separations of 100 Mpc/h. Unlike traditional IA measurements of individual galaxies, this estimator is not limited by imaging of galaxy shapes and allows for direct IA detection beyond redshift z = 1. Multiplet alignment is a form of higher-order clustering, for which the scale-dependence traces the underlying tidal field and amplitude is a result of small-scale (< 1 Mpc/h) dynamics. Within samples of bright galaxies (BGS), luminous red galaxies (LRG) and emission-line galaxies (ELG), we find similar scale-dependence regardless of intrinsic luminosity or colour. This is promising for measuring tidal alignment in galaxy samples that typically display no intrinsic alignment. DESI's LRG mock galaxy catalogues created from the AbacusSummit N-body simulations produce a similar alignment signal, though with a 33% lower amplitude at all scales. An analytic model using a non-linear power spectrum (NLA) only matches the signal down to 20 Mpc/h. Our detection demonstrates that galaxy clustering in the non-linear regime of structure formation preserves an interpretable memory of the large-scale tidal field. Multiplet alignment complements traditional two-point measurements by retaining directional information imprinted by tidal forces, and contains additional line-of-sight information compared to weak lensing. This is a more effective estimator than the alignment of individual galaxies in dense, blue, or faint galaxy samples.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

Changing-look Active Galactic Nuclei from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument. II. Statistical Properties from the First Data Release

We present the identification of changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL-AGNs) from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument First Data Release and Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 16 at z \leq 0.9. To confirm the CL-AGNs, we utilize spectral flux calibration assessment via an [O\,{\sc iii}]-based calibration, pseudo-photometry examination, and visual inspection. This rigorous selection process allows us to compile a statistical catalog of 561 CL-AGNs, encompassing 527 $\rm Hβ$, 149$\rm Hα$, and 129 Mg II CL behaviors. In this sample, we find 1) a 283:278 ratio of turn-on to turn-off CL-AGNs. 2) the critical value for CL events is confirmed around Eddington ratio \sim 0.01. 3) a strong correlation between the change in the luminosity of the broad emission lines (BEL) and variation in the continuum luminosity, with Mg II and $\rm Hβ$ displaying similar responses during CL phases. 4) the Baldwin-Phillips-Terlevich diagram for CL-AGNs shows no statistically difference from the general AGN catalog. 5) five CL-AGNs are associated with asymmetrical mid-infrared flares, possibly linked to tidal disruption events. Given the large CL-AGNs and the stochastic sampling of spectra, we propose that some CL events are inherently due to typical AGN variability during low accretion rates, particularly for CL events of the singular BEL. Finally, we introduce a Peculiar CL phase, characterized by a gradual decline over decades in the light curve and the complete disappearance of entire BEL in faint spectra, indicative of a real transition in the accretion disk.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Performance of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument(DESI) Fiber System

The recently commissioned Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) will measure the expansion historyof the universe using the Baryon Acoustic Oscillation technique. The spectra of 35 million galaxies and quasarsover 14000 sq deg will be measured during the life of the experiment. A new prime focus corrector for theKPNO Mayall telescope delivers light to 5000 fiber optic positioners. The fibers in turn feed ten broad-bandspectrographs. We describe key aspects and lessons learned from the development, delivery and installation ofthe fiber system at the Mayall telescope.

astro-ph.IM↗

arXiv2024

The Uchuu-GLAM BOSS and eBOSS LRG lightcones: Exploring clustering and covariance errors

This study investigates the clustering and bias of Luminous Red Galaxies (LRG) in the BOSS-LOWZ, -CMASS, -COMB, and eBOSS samples, using two types of simulated lightcones: (i) high-fidelity lightcones from Uchuu $N$-body simulation, employing SHAM technique to assign LRG to (sub)halos, and (ii) 16000 covariance lightcones from GLAM-Uchuu $N$-body simulations, including LRG using HOD data from Uchuu. Our results indicate that Uchuu and GLAM lightcones closely replicate BOSS/eBOSS data, reproducing correlation function and power spectrum across scales from redshifts $0.2$ to $1.0$, from $2$ to $150\,h^{-1}\mathrm{Mpc}$ in configuration space, from $0.005$ to $0.7\,h\mathrm{Mpc}^{-1}$ in Fourier space, and across different LRG stellar masses. Furthermore, comparing with existing MD-Patchy and EZmock BOSS/eBOSS lightcones based on approximate methods, our GLAM-Uchuu lightcones provide more precise clustering estimates. We identify significant deviations from observations within $20\,h^{-1}\mathrm{Mpc}$ scales in MD-Patchy and EZmock, with our covariance matrices indicating that these methods underestimate errors by between $10\%$ and $60\%$. Lastly, we explore the impact of cosmology on galaxy clustering. Our findings suggest that, given the current level of uncertainties in BOSS/eBOSS data, distinguishing models with and without massive neutrino effects on LSS is challenging. This paper highlights the Uchuu and GLAM-Uchuu simulations' robustness in verifying the accuracy of Planck cosmological parameters, providing a strong foundation for enhancing lightcone construction in future LSS surveys. We also demonstrate that generating thousands of galaxy lightcones is feasible using $N$-body simulations with adequate mass and force resolution.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

AuriDESI: Mock Catalogues for the DESI Milky Way Survey

The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument Milky Way Survey (DESI MWS) will explore the assembly history of the Milky Way by characterising remnants of ancient dwarf galaxy accretion events and improving constraints on the distribution of dark matter in the outer halo. We present mock catalogues that reproduce the selection criteria of MWS and the format of the final MWS data set. These catalogues can be used to test methods for quantifying the properties of stellar halo substructure and reconstructing the Milky Way's accretion history with the MWS data, including the effects of halo-to-halo variance. The mock catalogues are based on a phase-space kernel expansion technique applied to star particles in the Auriga suite of six high-resolution $Λ$CDM magneto-hydrodynamic zoom-in simulations. They include photometric properties (and associated errors) used in DESI target selection and the outputs of the MWS spectral analysis pipeline (radial velocity, metallicity, surface gravity, and temperature). They also include information from the underlying simulation, such as the total gravitational potential and information on the progenitors of accreted halo stars. We discuss how the subset of halo stars observable by MWS in these simulations corresponds to their true content and properties. These mock Milky Ways have rich accretion histories, resulting in a large number of substructures that span the whole stellar halo out to large distances and have substantial overlap in the space of orbital energy and angular momentum.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Emission Line Predictions for Mock Galaxy Catalogues: a New Differentiable and Empirical Mapping from DESI

We present a simple, differentiable method for predicting emission line strengths from rest-frame optical continua using an empirically-determined mapping. Extensive work has been done to develop mock galaxy catalogues that include robust predictions for galaxy photometry, but reliably predicting the strengths of emission lines has remained challenging. Our new mapping is a simple neural network implemented using the JAX Python automatic differentiation library. It is trained on Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument Early Release data to predict the equivalent widths (EWs) of the eight brightest optical emission lines (including H$α$, H$β$, [O II], and [O III]) from a galaxy's rest-frame optical continuum. The predicted EW distributions are consistent with the observed ones when noise is accounted for, and we find Spearman's rank correlation coefficient $ρ_s > 0.87$ between predictions and observations for most lines. Using a non-linear dimensionality reduction technique (UMAP), we show that this is true for galaxies across the full range of observed spectral energy distributions. In addition, we find that adding measurement uncertainties to the predicted line strengths is essential for reproducing the distribution of observed line-ratios in the BPT diagram. Our trained network can easily be incorporated into a differentiable stellar population synthesis pipeline without hindering differentiability or scalability with GPUs. A synthetic catalogue generated with such a pipeline can be used to characterise and account for biases in the spectroscopic training sets used for training and calibration of photo-$z$'s, improving the modelling of systematic incompleteness for the Rubin Observatory LSST and other surveys.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

The MOST Hosts Survey: spectroscopic observation of the host galaxies of ~40,000 transients using DESI

We present the MOST Hosts survey (Multi-Object Spectroscopy of Transient Hosts). The survey is planned to run throughout the five years of operation of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) and will generate a spectroscopic catalog of the hosts of most transients observed to date, in particular all the supernovae observed by most public, untargeted, wide-field, optical surveys (PTF/iPTF, SDSS II, ZTF, DECAT, DESIRT). Scientific questions for which the MOST Hosts survey will be useful include Type Ia supernova cosmology, fundamental plane and peculiar velocity measurements, and the understanding of the correlations between transients and their host galaxy properties. Here, we present the first release of the MOST Hosts survey: 21,931 hosts of 20,235 transients. These numbers represent 36% of the final MOST Hosts sample, consisting of 60,212 potential host galaxies of 38,603 transients (a transient can be assigned multiple potential hosts). Of these galaxies, 40% do not appear in the DESI primary target list and therefore require a specific program like MOST Hosts. Of all the transients in the MOST Hosts list, only 26.7% have existing classifications, and so the survey will provide redshifts (and luminosities) for nearly 30,000 transients. A preliminary Hubble diagram and a transient luminosity-duration diagram are shown as examples of future potential uses of the MOST Hosts survey. The survey will also provide a training sample of spectroscopically observed transients for photometry-only classifiers, as we enter an era when most newly observed transients will lack spectroscopic classification. The MOST Hosts DESI survey data will be released through the Wiserep platform on a rolling cadence and updated to match the DESI releases. Dates of future releases and updates are available through the https://mosthosts.desi.lbl.gov website.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2024

Constraints on the spacetime variation of the fine-structure constant using DESI emission-line galaxies

We present strong constraints on the spacetime variation of the fine-structure constant $α$ using the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). In this pilot work, we utilize $\sim110,000$ galaxies with strong and narrow O III $λλ$4959,5007 emission lines to measure the relative variation $Δα/α$ in space and time. The O III doublet is arguably the best choice for this purpose owing to its wide wavelength separation between the two lines and its strong emission in many galaxies. Our galaxy sample spans a redshift range of $0<z<0.95$, covering half of all cosmic time. We divide the sample into subsamples in 10 redshift bins ($Δz=0.1$), and calculate $Δα/α$ for the individual subsamples. The uncertainties of the measured $Δα/α$ are roughly between $2\times10^{-6}$ and $2\times10^{-5}$. We find an apparent $α$ variation with redshift at a level of $Δα/α=(2\sim3)\times10^{-5}$. This is highly likely to be caused by systematics associated with wavelength calibration, since such small systematics can be caused by a wavelength distortion of $0.002-0.003$ Å, which is beyond the accuracy that the current DESI data can achieve. We refine the wavelength calibration using sky lines for a small fraction of the galaxies, but it does not change our main results. We further probe the spatial variation of $α$ in small redshift ranges, and do not find obvious, large-scale structures in the spatial distribution of $Δα/α$. As DESI is ongoing, we will include more galaxies, and by improving the wavelength calibration, we expect to obtain a better constraint that is comparable to the strongest current constraint.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

DESI z >~ 5 Quasar Survey. I. A First Sample of 400 New Quasars at z ~ 4.7-6.6

We report the first results of a high-redshift ($z$ >~ 5) quasar survey using the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). As a DESI secondary target program, this survey is designed to carry out a systematic search and investigation of quasars at $z$ >~ 5, up to redshift 6.8. The target selection is based on the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys (the Legacy Surveys) DR9 photometry, combined with the Pan-STARRS1 data and $J$-band photometry from public surveys. A first quasar sample has been constructed from the DESI Survey Validation 3 (SV3) and first-year observations until May 2022. This sample includes more than 400 new quasars at redshift 4.7 <= $z$ < 6.6, down to 21.5 magnitude in the $z$ band, discovered from 35% of the entire target sample. Remarkably, there are 220 new quasars identified at $z$ >= 5, more than one third of existing quasars previously published at this redshift. The observations so far result in an average success rate of 23% at $z$ > 4.7. The current spectral dataset has already allowed analysis of interesting individual objects (e.g., quasars with damped Ly$α$ absorbers and broad absorption line features), and statistical analysis will follow the survey's completion. A set of science projects will be carried out leveraging this program, including quasar luminosity function, quasar clustering, intergalactic medium, quasar spectral properties, intervening absorbers, and properties of early supermassive black holes. Additionally, a sample of 38 new quasars at $z$ ~ 3.8-5.7 discovered from a pilot survey in the DESI SV1 is also published in this paper.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Redshift-dependent RSD bias from Intrinsic Alignment with DESI Year 1 Spectra

We estimate the redshift-dependent, anisotropic clustering signal in DESI's Year 1 Survey created by tidal alignments of Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) and a selection-induced galaxy orientation bias. To this end, we measured the correlation between LRG shapes and the tidal field with DESI's Year 1 redshifts, as traced by LRGs and Emission-Line Galaxies (ELGs). We also estimate the galaxy orientation bias of LRGs caused by DESI's aperture-based selection, and find it to increase by a factor of seven between redshifts 0.4 - 1.1 due to redder, fainter galaxies falling closer to DESI's imaging selection cuts. These effects combine to dampen measurements of the quadrupole of the correlation function caused by structure growth on scales of 10 - 80 Mpc/h by about 0.15% for low redshifts (0.4<z<0.6) and 0.8% for high (0.8<z<1.1). We provide estimates of the quadrupole signal created by intrinsic alignments that can be used to correct this effect, which is necessary to meet DESI's forecasted precision on measuring the growth rate of structure. While imaging quality varies across DESI's footprint, we find no significant difference in this effect between imaging regions in the Legacy Imaging Survey.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2023

The Correlation Function and Detection of Baryon Acoustic Oscillation Peak from the Spectroscopic SDSS GalWCat Galaxy Cluster Catalogue

We measure the two point correlation function (CF) of 1357 galaxy clusters with a mass of $\log_{10}{M_{200}}\geq 13.6$~\hm~and at a redshift of $z \leq 0.125$. This work differs from previous analyses in that it utilizes a spectroscopic cluster catalogue, $\mathtt{SDSS-GalWCat}$, to measure the CF and detect the baryon acoustic oscillation (BAO) signal. Unlike previous studies which use statistical techniques, we compute covariance errors directly by generating a set of 1086 galaxy cluster lightcones from the GLAM $N$-body simulation. Fitting the CF with a power-law model of the form $ξ(s) = (s/s_0)^{-γ}$, we determine the best-fit correlation length and power-law index at three mass thresholds. We find that the correlation length increases with increasing the mass threshold while the power-law index is almost constant. For $\log_{10}{M_{200}}\geq 13.6$~\hm, we find $s_0 = 14.54\pm0.87$~\h~and $γ=1.97\pm0.11$. We detect the BAO signal at $s = 100$~\h~with a significance of $1.60 σ$. Fitting the CF with a $Λ$CDM model, we find $D_\mathrm{V}(z = 0.089)\mathrm{r}^{fid}_d/\mathrm{r}_d = 267.62 \pm 26$ \h, consistent with Planck 2015 cosmology. We present a set of 108 high-fidelity simulated galaxy cluster lightcones from the high-resolution \U~N-body simulation, employed for methodological validation. We find $D_\mathrm{V}(z = 0.089)/r_d = 2.666 \pm 0.129$, indicating that our method does not introduce any bias in the parameter estimation for this small sample of galaxy clusters.

astro-ph.CO↗