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Giovanni Covone

Publications and source records attributed to Giovanni Covone.

54 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

Weak Lensing Study in VOICE Survey II: Shear Bias Calibrations

The VST Optical Imaging of the CDFS and ES1 Fields (VOICE) Survey is proposed to obtain deep optical $ugri$ imaging of the CDFS and ES1 fields using the VLT Survey Telescope (VST). At present, the observations for the CDFS field have been completed, and comprise in total about 4.9 deg$^2$ down to $r_\mathrm{AB}$$\sim$26 mag. In the companion paper by Fu et al. (2018), we present the weak lensing shear measurements for $r$-band images with seeing $\le$ 0.9 arcsec. In this paper, we perform image simulations to calibrate possible biases of the measured shear signals. Statistically, the properties of the simulated point spread function (PSF) and galaxies show good agreements with those of observations. The multiplicative bias is calibrated to reach an accuracy of $\sim$3.0%. We study the bias sensitivities to the undetected faint galaxies and to the neighboring galaxies. We find that undetected galaxies contribute to the multiplicative bias at the level of $\sim$0.3%. Further analysis shows that galaxies with lower signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) are impacted more significantly because the undetected galaxies skew the background noise distribution. For the neighboring galaxies, we find that although most have been rejected in the shape measurement procedure, about one third of them still remain in the final shear sample. They show a larger ellipticity dispersion and contribute to $\sim$0.2% of the multiplicative bias. Such a bias can be removed by further eliminating these neighboring galaxies. But the effective number density of the galaxies can be reduced considerably. Therefore efficient methods should be developed for future weak lensing deep surveys.

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Next Generation Virgo Cluster Survey. XXI. The weak lensing masses of the CFHTLS and NGVS RedGOLD galaxy clusters and calibration of the optical richness

We measured stacked weak lensing cluster masses for a sample of 1325 galaxy clusters detected by the RedGOLD algorithm in the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Legacy Survey W1 and the Next Generation Virgo Cluster Survey at $0.2<z<0.5$, in the optical richness range $10<λ<70$. After a selection of our best richness subsample ($20<λ<50$), this is the most comprehensive lensing study of a $\sim 100\%$ complete and $\sim 90\%$ pure optical cluster catalogue in this redshift range, with a total of 346 clusters in $\sim164~deg^2$. We test three different mass models, and our best model includes a basic halo model, with a Navarro Frenk and White profile, and correction terms that take into account cluster miscentering, non-weak shear, the two-halo term, the contribution of the Brightest Cluster Galaxy, and an a posteriori correction for the intrinsic scatter in the mass-richness relation. With this model, we obtain a mass-richness relation of $\log{M_{\rm 200}/M_{\odot}}=(14.48\pm0.04)+(1.14\pm0.23)\log{(λ/40)}$ (statistical uncertainties). This result is consistent with other published lensing mass-richness relations. When compared to X-ray masses and mass proxies, we find that on average weak lensing masses are $\sim 10\%$ higher than those derived in the X-ray in the range $2\times10^{13}M_{\rm \odot}<E(z) M^{X}_{\rm 200}<2\times10^{14}M_{\rm \odot}$, in agreement with most previous results and simulations. We also give the coefficients of the scaling relations between the lensing mass and X-ray mass proxies, $L_X$ and $T_X$, and compare them with previous results.

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PSZ2LenS. Weak lensing analysis of the Planck clusters in the CFHTLenS and in the RCSLenS

The possibly unbiased selection process in surveys of the Sunyaev Zel'dovich effect can unveil new populations of galaxy clusters. We performed a weak lensing analysis of the PSZ2LenS sample, i.e. the PSZ2 galaxy clusters detected by the Planck mission in the sky portion covered by the lensing surveys CFHTLenS and RCSLenS. PSZ2LenS consists of 35 clusters and it is a statistically complete and homogeneous subsample of the PSZ2 catalogue. The Planck selected clusters appear to be unbiased tracers of the massive end of the cosmological haloes. The mass concentration relation of the sample is in excellent agreement with predictions from the Lambda cold dark matter model. The stacked lensing signal is detected at 14 sigma significance over the radial range 0.1<R<3.2 Mpc/h, and is well described by the cuspy dark halo models predicted by numerical simulations. We confirmed that Planck estimated masses are biased low by b_SZ= 27+-11(stat)+-8(sys) per cent with respect to weak lensing masses. The bias is higher for the cosmological subsample, b_SZ= 40+-14+-(stat)+-8(sys) per cent.

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Mass-concentration relation of clusters of galaxies from CFHTLenS

Based on weak lensing data from the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Lensing Survey (CFHTLenS), in this paper we study the mass-concentration ($M$-$c$) relation for $\sim 200$ redMaPPer clusters in the fields. We extract the $M$-$c$ relation by measuring the density profiles of individual clusters instead of using stacked weak lensing signals. By performing Monte Carlo simulations, we demonstrate that although the signal-to-noise ratio for each individual cluster is low, the unbiased $M$-$c$ relation can still be reliably derived from a large sample of clusters by carefully taking into account the impacts of shape noise, cluster center offset, dilution effect from member or foreground galaxies, and the projection effect. Our results show that within error bars the derived $M$-$c$ relation for redMaPPer clusters is in agreement with simulation predictions. There is a weak deviation in that the halo concentrations calibrated by Monte Carlo simulations are somewhat higher than that predicted from ${\it Planck}$ cosmology.

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The first and second data releases of the Kilo-Degree Survey

The Kilo-Degree Survey (KiDS) is an optical wide-field imaging survey carried out with the VLT Survey Telescope and the OmegaCAM camera. KiDS will image 1500 square degrees in four filters (ugri), and together with its near-infrared counterpart VIKING will produce deep photometry in nine bands. Designed for weak lensing shape and photometric redshift measurements, the core science driver of the survey is mapping the large-scale matter distribution in the Universe back to a redshift of ~0.5. Secondary science cases are manifold, covering topics such as galaxy evolution, Milky Way structure, and the detection of high-redshift clusters and quasars. KiDS is an ESO Public Survey and dedicated to serving the astronomical community with high-quality data products derived from the survey data, as well as with calibration data. Public data releases will be made on a yearly basis, the first two of which are presented here. For a total of 148 survey tiles (~160 sq.deg.) astrometrically and photometrically calibrated, coadded ugri images have been released, accompanied by weight maps, masks, source lists, and a multi-band source catalog. A dedicated pipeline and data management system based on the Astro-WISE software system, combined with newly developed masking and source classification software, is used for the data production of the data products described here. The achieved data quality and early science projects based on the data products in the first two data releases are reviewed in order to validate the survey data. Early scientific results include the detection of nine high-z QSOs, fifteen candidate strong gravitational lenses, high-quality photometric redshifts and galaxy structural parameters for hundreds of thousands of galaxies. (Abridged)

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New constraints on $σ_8$ from a joint analysis of stacked gravitational lensing and clustering of galaxy clusters

The joint analysis of clustering and stacked gravitational lensing of galaxy clusters in large surveys can constrain the formation and evolution of structures and the cosmological parameters. On scales outside a few virial radii, the halo bias, $b$, is linear and the lensing signal is dominated by the correlated distribution of matter around galaxy clusters. We discuss a method to measure the power spectrum amplitude $σ_8$ and $b$ based on a minimal modelling. We considered a sample of $\sim 120000$ clusters photometrically selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey in the redshift range $0.1<z<0.6$. The auto-correlation was studied through the two-point function of a subsample of $\sim 70000$ clusters; the matter-halo correlation was derived from the weak lensing signal of the subsample of $\sim 1200$ clusters with Canada-France-Hawaii Lensing Survey data. We obtained a direct measurement of $b$, which increases with mass in agreement with predictions of the $Λ$CDM paradigm. Assuming $Ω_\mathrm{M}=0.3$, we found $σ_8=0.78\pm0.16$. We used the same clusters for measuring both lensing and clustering and the estimate of $σ_8$ did require neither the mass-richness relation, nor the knowledge of the selection function, nor the modelling of $b$. With an additional theoretical prior on the bias, we obtained $σ_8=0.75\pm0.08$.

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Source plane reconstruction of the giant gravitational arc in Abell 2667: a candidate Wolf-Rayet galaxy at z~1

We present a new analysis of HST, Spitzer telescope imaging and VLT imaging and spectroscopic data of a bright lensed galaxy at $z$=1.0334 in the lensing cluster Abell~2667. Using this high-resolution imaging we present an updated lens model that allows us to fully understand the lensing geometry and reconstruct the lensed galaxy in the source plane. This giant arc gives a unique opportunity to peer into the structure of a high-redshift disk galaxy. We find that the lensed galaxy of Abell 2667 is a typical spiral galaxy with morphology similar to the structure of its counterparts at higher redshift $z\sim 2$. The surface brightness of the reconstructed source galaxy in the z$_{850}$ band reveals the central surface brightness $I(0)=20.28\pm0.22$ mag arcsec$^{-2}$ and the characteristic radius $r_s=2.01\pm0.16$ kpc at redshift $z \sim 1$. The morphological reconstruction in different bands shows obvious negative radial color gradients for this galaxy. Moreover, the redder central bulge tends to contain a metal-rich stellar population, rather than being heavily reddened by dust due to high and patchy obscuration. We analyze the VIMOS/IFU spectroscopic data and find that, in the given wavelength range ($\sim 1800-3200$ Å), the combined arc spectrum of the source galaxy is characterized by a strong continuum emission with strong UV absorption lines (FeII and MgII) and shows the features of a typical starburst Wolf-Rayet galaxy NGC5253. More specifically, we have measured the EWs of FeII and MgII lines in the Abell 2667 spectrum, and obtained similar values for the same wavelength interval of the NGC5253 spectrum. Marginal evidence for CIII] 1909 emission at the edge of the grism range further confirms our expectation.

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Measurement of the halo bias from stacked shear profiles of galaxy clusters

We present the observational evidence of the 2-halo term in the stacked shear profile of a sample of about 1200 optically selected galaxy clusters based on imaging data and the public shear catalog from the CFHTLenS. We find that the halo bias, a measure of the correlated distribution of matter around galaxy clusters, has amplitude and correlation with galaxy cluster mass in very good agreement with the predictions based on the LCDM standard cosmological model. The mass-concentration relation is flat but higher than theoretical predictions. We also confirm the close scaling relation between the optical richness of galaxy clusters and their mass.

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The mass-concentration relation in massive galaxy clusters at redshift ~1

Mass and concentration of clusters of galaxies are related and evolving with redshift. We study the properties of a sample of 31 massive galaxy clusters at high redshift, 0.8 < z < 1.5, using weak and strong lensing observations. Concentration is a steep function of mass, c_{200} ~M_{200}^{-0.83 +-0.39}, with higher-redshift clusters being less concentrated. Mass and concentration from the stacked analysis, M_{200}=(4.1+-0.4)x10^{14}M_Sun/h and c_{200}=2.3+-0.2, are in line with theoretical results extrapolated from the local universe. Clusters with signs of dynamical activity preferentially feature high concentrations. We discuss the possibility that the whole sample is a mix of two different kinds of haloes. Over-concentrated clusters might be accreting haloes out of equilibrium in a transient phase of compression, whereas less concentrated ones might be more relaxed.

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A multi-wavelength study of the gravitational lens COSMOS J095930+023427

We present a multi-wavelength study of the gravitational lens COSMOS J095930+023427 (z=0.89), together with the associated galaxy group located at $z\sim0.7$ along the line of sight and the lensed background galaxy. The source redshift is currently unknown, but estimated to be at $z_s \sim 2$. The analysis is based on the available public HST, Subaru, Chandra imaging data, and VLT spectroscopy. The lensing system is an early-type galaxy showing a strong [OII] emission line, and produces 4 bright images of the distant background source. It has an Einstein radius of 0.79", about 4 times large than the effective radius. We perform a lensing analysis using both a Singular Isothermal Ellipsoid (SIE) and a Peudo-Isothermal Elliptical Mass Distribution (PIEMD) for the lensing galaxy, and find that the final results on the total mass, the dark matter (DM) fraction within the Einstein radius and the external shear due to a foreground galaxy group are robust with respect of the choice of the parametric model and the source redshift (yet unknown). We measure the luminous mass from the photometric data, and find the DM fraction within the Einstein radius $f_{\rm DM}$ to be between $0.71\pm 0.13$ and $0.79 \pm 0.15$, depending on the unknown source redshift. Meanwhile, the non-null external shear found in our lensing models supports the presence and structure of a galaxy group at $z\sim0.7$, and an independent measurement of the 0.5-2 keV X-ray luminosity within 20" around the X-ray centroid provides a group mass of $M=(3-10)\times 10^{13}$ M$_{\odot}$, in good agreement with the previous estimate derived through weak lensing analysis.

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The evolution of the mass-size relation for early type galaxies from z~1 to the present: dependence on environment, mass-range and detailed morphology

[abridged] We study the dependence of the galaxy size evolution on morphology, stellar mass and large scale environment for a sample of 298 group and 384 field quiescent early-type galaxies from the COSMOS survey, selected from z~1 to the present, and with masses $log(M/M_\odot)>10.5$. The galaxy size growth depends on galaxy mass and early-type galaxy morphology, e.g., elliptical galaxies evolve differently than lenticular galaxies. At the low mass end -$10.5 11.2$- approximately doubled their size. Interestingly, lenticular galaxies display different behavior: they appear more compact on average and they do show a size growth of \sim60% since z=1 independent of stellar mass. We compare our results with state-of-the art semi-analytic models. While major and minor mergers can account for most of the galaxy size growth, we find that with present data and the theoretical uncertainties in the modeling we cannot state clear evidence favoring either merger or mass loss via quasar and/or stellar winds as the primary mechanism driving the evolution. The galaxy mass--size relation and the size growth do not depend on environment in the halo mass range explored in this work (field to group mass $log(M_h/M_\odot)<14$), i.e., group and field galaxies follow the same trends, which is at variance with predictions from current hierarchical models that show a clear dependence of size growth on halo mass for massive ellipticals -$log(M_*/M_\odot)>11.2$.

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Testing the dark energy with gravitational lensing statistics

We study the redshift distribution of two samples of early-type gravitational lenses, extracted from a larger collection of 122 systems, to constrain the cosmological constant in the LCDM model and the parameters of a set of alternative dark energy models (XCDM, Dvali-Gabadadze-Porrati and Ricci dark energy models), under a spatially flat universe. The likelihood is maximized for $Ω_Λ= 0.70 \pm 0.09$ when considering the sample excluding the SLACS systems (known to be biased towards large image-separation lenses) and no-evolution, and $Ω_Λ= 0.81\pm 0.05$ when limiting to gravitational lenses with image separation larger than 2" and no-evolution. In both cases, results accounting for galaxy evolution are consistent within 1$σ$. The present test supports the accelerated expansion, by excluding the null-hypothesis (i.e., $Ω_Λ= 0 $) at more than 4$σ$, regardless of the chosen sample and assumptions on the galaxy evolution. A comparison between competitive world models is performed by means of the Bayesian information criterion. This shows that the simplest cosmological constant model - that has only one free parameter - is still preferred by the available data on the redshift distribution of gravitational lenses. We perform an analysis of the possible systematic effects, finding that the systematic errors due to sample incompleteness, galaxy evolution and model uncertainties approximately equal the statistical errors, with present-day data. We find that the largest sources of systemic errors are the dynamical normalization and the high-velocity cut-off factor, followed by the faint-end slope of the velocity dispersion function.

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Galaxies in X-ray Groups I: Robust Membership Assignment and the Impact of Group Environments on Quenching

Understanding the mechanisms that lead dense environments to host galaxies with redder colors, more spheroidal morphologies, and lower star formation rates than field populations remains an important problem. As most candidate processes ultimately depend on host halo mass, accurate characterizations of the local environment, ideally tied to halo mass estimates and spanning a range in halo mass and redshift are needed. In this work, we present and test a rigorous, probabalistic method for assigning galaxies to groups based on precise photometric redshifts and X-ray selected groups drawn from the COSMOS field. The groups have masses in the range 10^13 < M_200c/M_sun < 10^14 and span redshifts 0<z<1. We characterize our selection algorithm via tests on spectroscopic subsamples, including new data obtained at the VLT, and by applying our method to detailed mock catalogs. We find that our group member galaxy sample has a purity of 84% and completeness of 92% within 0.5 R200c. We measure the impact of uncertainties in redshifts and group centering on the quality of the member selection with simulations based on current data as well as future imaging and spectroscopic surveys. As a first application of our new group member catalog which will be made publicly available, we show that member galaxies exhibit a higher quenched fraction compared to the field at fixed stellar mass out to z~1, indicating a significant relationship between star formation and environment at group scales. We also address the suggestion that dusty star forming galaxies in such groups may impact the high-l power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background and find that such a population cannot explain the low power seen in recent SZ measurements.

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First catalog of strong lens candidates in the COSMOS field

We present the first catalog of 67 strong galaxy-galaxy lens candidates discovered in the 1.64 square degree Hubble Space Telescope COSMOS survey. Twenty of these systems display multiple images or strongly curved large arcs. Our initial search is performed by visual inspection of the data and is restricted, for practical considerations, to massive early-type lens galaxies with arcs found at radii smaller than ~5''. Simple mass models are constructed for the best lens candidates and our results are compared to the strong lensing catalogs of the SLACS survey and the CASTLES database. These new strong galaxy-galaxy lensing systems constitute a valuable sample to study the mass distribution of early-type galaxies and their associated dark matter halos. We further expect this sample to play an important role in the testing of software algorithms designed to automatically search for strong gravitational lenses. From our analysis a robust lower limit is derived for the expected occurrence of strong galaxy-galaxy systems in current and future space-based wide-field imaging surveys. We expect that such surveys should uncover a large number of strong lensing systems (more than 10 systems per square degree), which will allow for a detailed statistical analysis of galaxy properties and will likely lead to constraints on models of gravitational structure formation and cosmology. The sample of strong lenses is available here: http://cosmosstronglensing.uni-hd.de/

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A Telescope Search for Decaying Relic Axions

A search for optical line emission from the two-photon decay of relic axions was conducted in the galaxy clusters Abell 2667 and 2390, using spectra from the VIMOS (Visible Multi-Object Spectrograph) integral field unit at the Very Large Telescope. New upper limits to the two-photon coupling of the axion are derived, and are at least a factor of 3 more stringent than previous upper limits in this mass window. The improvement follows from larger collecting area, integration time, and spatial resolution, as well as from improvements in signal to noise and sky subtraction made possible by strong-lensing mass models of these clusters. The new limits either require that the two-photon coupling of the axion be extremely weak or that the axion mass window between 4.5 eV and 7.7 eV be closed. Implications for sterile-neutrino dark matter are discussed briefly also.

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A statistical study of multiply-imaged systems in the lensing cluster Abell 68

We have carried out an extensive spectroscopic survey with the Keck and VLT telescopes, targeting lensed galaxies in the background of the massive cluster Abell 68. Spectroscopic measurements are obtained for 26 lensed images, including a distant galaxy at z=5.4 . Redshifts have been determined for 5 out of 7 multiply-image systems. Through a careful modeling of the mass distribution in the strongly-lensed regime, we derive a mass estimate of 5.3 x 10^14 Msun within 500 kpc. Our mass model is then used to constrain the redshift distribution of the remaining multiply-imaged and singly-imaged sources. This enables us to examine the physical properties for a subsample of 7 Lyman-alpha emitters at 1.7 < z < 5.5, whose unlensed luminosities of ~ 10^41 ergs/s are fainter than similar objects found in blank fields. Of particular interest is an extended Lyman-alpha emission region surrounding a highly magnified source at z=2.6, detected in VIMOS Integral Field Spectroscopy data. The physical scale of the most distant lensed source at z=5.4 is very small (<300 pc), similar to the lensed z ~ 5.6 emitter reported by Ellis et al. (2001) in Abell 2218. New photometric data available for Abell 2218 allow for a direct comparison between these two unique objects. Our survey illustrates the practicality of using lensing clusters to probe the faint end of the z ~ 2-5 Lyman-alpha luminosity function in a manner that is complementary to blank field narrow-band surveys.

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First results from the VIMOS-IFU survey of gravitationally lensing clusters at z~0.2

We present the on-going observational program of a VIMOS Integral Field Unit survey of the central regions of massive, gravitational lensing galaxy clusters at redshift z~0.2. We have observed six clusters using the low-resolution blue grism (R about 200), and the spectroscopic survey is complemented by a wealth of photometric data, including Hubble Space Telescope optical data and near infrared VLT data. The principal scientific aims of this project are: the study of the high-z lensed galaxies, the transformation and evolution of galaxies in cluster cores and the use of multiple images to constrain cosmography. We briefly report here on the first results from this project on the clusters Abell 2667 and Abell 68.

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A VIMOS-IFU survey of $z \sim 0.2$ massive lensing galaxy clusters: constraining cosmography

We present an integral field spectroscopy survey of rich clusters of galaxies aimed at studying their lensing properties. Thanks to knowledge of the spectroscopic caracteristics of more than three families of multiple images in a single lens, one is able in principle to derive constraints on the geometric cosmological parameters. We show that this ambitious program is feasible and present some new results, in particular the redshift measurement of the giant arc in A2667 and the resdshift confirmation of the counter-image of the radial arc in MS2137--23. Prospects for the future of such program are presented.

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