arXiv subjects

Zvonimir Vlah

Publications and source records attributed to Zvonimir Vlah.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Optimizing the Evolution of Perturbations in the $Λ$CDM Universe

Perturbation theory is a powerful tool for studying large-scale structure formation in the universe and calculating observables such as the power spectrum or bispectrum. However, beyond linear order, typically this is done by assuming a simplification in the time-dependence of gravitational-coupling kernels between the matter and velocity fluctuations. Though the true dependencies are known for Lambda cold dark matter cosmologies, they are ignored due to the computational costs associated with considering them in full and, instead, are replaced by simpler dependencies valid for an Einstein--de-Sitter cosmology. Here we develop, implement and demonstrate the effectiveness of a new numerical method for finding the full dynamical evolution of these kernels to all perturbative orders based upon spectral methods using Chebyshev polynomials. This method is found to be orders of magnitude more efficient than direct numerical solvers while still producing highly accurate and reliable results. A code implementation of the Chebyshev spectral method is then presented and characterised. The code has been made publicly available alongside this paper. We expect our method to be of use for interpretation of upcoming galaxy clustering measurements.

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arXiv2023

Effective Field Theory of Intrinsic Alignments at One Loop Order: a Comparison to Dark Matter Simulations

We test the regime of validity of the effective field theory (EFT) of intrinsic alignments (IA) at the one-loop level by comparing with 3D halo shape statistics in N-body simulations. This model is based on the effective field theory of large-scale structure (EFT of LSS) and thus a theoretically well-motivated extension of the familiar non-linear alignment (NLA) model and the tidal-alignment-tidal-torquing (TATT) model. It contains a total of $8$ free bias parameters. Specifically, we measure the dark matter halo shape-shape multipoles $P_{EE}^{(0)}(k), P_{EE}^{(2)}(k), P_{BB}^{(0)}(k), P_{BB}^{(2)}(k)$ as well as the matter-shape multipoles $P_{δE}^{(0)}(k), P_{δE}^{(2)}(k)$ from the simulations and perform a joint fit to determine the largest wavenumber $k_{\text{max}}$ up to which the theory predictions from the EFT of IA are consistent with the measurements. We find that the EFT of IA is able to describe intrinsic alignments of dark matter halos up to $k_\text{max}=0.30\,h/\text{Mpc}$ at $z=0$. This demonstrates a clear improvement over other existing alignment models like NLA and TATT, which are only accurate up to $k_\text{max}=0.05\,h/\text{Mpc}$ . We examine the posterior distributions of the higher-order bias parameters, and show that their inclusion is necessary to describe intrinsic alignments in the quasi-linear regime. Further, the EFT of IA is able to accurately describe the auto-spectrum of intrinsic alignment B-modes, in contrast to the other alignment models considered.

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arXiv2022

Perturbation theory of LSS in the $Λ$CDM Universe: exact time evolution and the two-loop power spectrum

We derive exact analytic solutions for density and velocity fields to all orders in Eulerian standard perturbation theory for $Λ$CDM cosmology. In particular, we show that density and velocity field kernels can be written in a separable form in time and momenta at each perturbative order. The kernel solutions are built from an analytic basis of momentum operators and their time-dependent coefficients, which solve a set of recursive differential equations. We also provide an exact closed perturbative solution for such coefficients, expanding around the (quasi-)EdS approximation. We find that the perturbative solution rapidly converges towards the numerically obtained solutions and its leading order result suffices for any practical requirements. To illustrate our findings, we compute the exact two-loop dark matter density and velocity power spectra in $Λ$CDM cosmology. We show that the difference between the exact $Λ$CDM and the (quasi-)EdS approximated result can reach the level of several percent (at redshift zero, for wavenumbers $k<1h/$Mpc). This deviation can be partially mitigated by exploiting the degeneracy with the EFT counterterms. As an additional benefit of our algorithm for the solutions of time-dependent coefficients, the computational complexity of power spectra loops in $Λ$CDM is comparable to the EdS case. In performing the two-loop computation, we devise an explicit method to implement the so-called IR cancellations, as well as the cancellations arising as a consequence of mass and momentum conservation.

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arXiv2022

A new analysis of galaxy 2-point functions in the BOSS survey, including full-shape information and post-reconstruction BAO

We present a new method for consistent, joint analysis of the pre- and post-reconstruction two-point functions of the BOSS survey. The post-reconstruction correlation function is used to accurately measure the distance-redshift relation and expansion history, while the pre-reconstruction power spectrum multipoles constrain the broad-band shape and the rate-of-growth of large-scale structure. Our technique uses Lagrangian perturbation theory to self-consistently work at the level of two-point functions, i.e.\ directly with the measured data, without approximating the constraints with summary statistics normalized by the drag scale. Combining galaxies across the full redshift range and both hemispheres we constrain $Ω_m=0.303 \pm 0.0082$, $H_0=69.23 \pm 0.77$ and $σ_8=0.733 \pm 0.047$ within the context of $Λ$CDM. These constraints are in good agreement both with the Planck primary CMB anisotropy data and recent cosmic shear surveys.

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arXiv2021

The Ly$α$ forest flux correlation function: a perturbation theory perspective

The Ly$α$ forest provides one of the best means of mapping large-scale structure at high redshift, including our tightest constraint on the distance-redshift relation before cosmic noon. We describe how the large-scale correlations in the Ly$α$ forest can be understood as an expansion in cumulants of the optical depth field, which itself can be related to the density field by a bias expansion. This provides a direct connection between the observable and the statistics of the matter fluctuations which can be computed in a systematic manner. We discuss the way in which complex, small-scale physics enters the predictions, the origin of the much-discussed velocity bias and the `renormalization' of the large-scale bias coefficients. Our calculations are within the context of perturbation theory, but we also make contact with earlier work using the peak-background split. Using the structure of the equations of motion we demonstrate, to all orders in perturbation theory, that the large-scale flux power spectrum becomes the linear spectrum times the square of a quadratic in the cosine of the angle to the line of sight. Unlike the case of galaxies, both the isotropic and anisotropic pieces receive contributions from small-scale physics.

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arXiv2021

Redshift-Space Distortions in Lagrangian Perturbation Theory

We present the one-loop 2-point function of biased tracers in redshift space computed with Lagrangian perturbation theory, including a full resummation of both long-wavelength (infrared) displacements and associated velocities. The resulting model accurately predicts the power spectrum and correlation function of halos and mock galaxies from two different sets of N-body simulations at the percent level for quasi-linear scales, including the damping of the baryon acoustic oscillation signal due to the bulk motions of galaxies. We compare this full resummation with other, approximate, techniques including the moment expansion and Gaussian streaming model. We discuss infrared resummation in detail and compare our Lagrangian formulation with the Eulerian theory augmented by an infrared resummation based on splitting the input power spectrum into "wiggle" and "no-wiggle" components. We show that our model is able to recover unbiased cosmological parameters in mock data encompassing a volume much larger than what will be available to future galaxy surveys. We demonstrate how to efficiently compute the resulting expressions numerically, making available a fast Python code capable of rapidly computing these statistics in both configuration and Fourier space.

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arXiv2020

Galaxy shape statistics in the effective field theory

Intrinsic galaxy alignments yield an important contribution to the observed statistics of galaxy shapes. The general bias expansion for galaxy sizes and shapes in three dimensions has been recently described by Vlah, Chisari \& Schmidt using the general perturbative effective field theory (EFT) framework, in analogy to the clustering of galaxies. In this work, we present a formalism that uses the properties of spherical tensors to project galaxy shapes onto the observed sky in the flat-sky approximation and compute the two-point functions at next-to-leading order as well as the leading-order three-point functions of galaxy shapes and number counts. The resulting expressions are given in forms that are convenient for efficient numerical implementation. For a source redshift distribution typical of Stage IV surveys, we find that that nonlinear intrinsic alignment contributions to galaxy shape correlations become relevant at angular wavenumbers $l \gtrsim 100$.

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arXiv2020

Perturbative description of bias tracers using consistency relations of LSS

We develop a simple formalism of biased tracers that we dub $\mathit{Monkey\ bias}$. In this formalism, a biased tracer field is constructed directly in terms of the linear matter fluctuation field and the set of derivative operators acting on it. Such bias expansion is first organized based on the general structure of non-linear dynamical equations for the biased tracers. Further physical conditions, like the equivalence principle, are imposed on tree-level correlators utilising the consistency relations. We obtain the bias expansion up to the third-order in linear matter fluctuation in the generalized $Λ$CDM background, which reproduces the previous results in the limit of the EdS universe. This algorithmic construction of our bias operator basis is well suited for extensions towards higher-order bias fields. Moreover, this formalism reveals that biased tracer dynamics in generalized $Λ$CDM background is not entirely degenerate with the rest of bias parameters, thus opening a possibility of testing the background cosmology through the observations of biased tracers.

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arXiv2020

Modeling features in the redshift-space halo power spectrum with perturbation theory

We study the ability of perturbative models with effective field theory contributions and infra-red resummation to model the redshift space clustering of biased tracers in models where the linear power spectrum has "features" -- either imprinted during inflation or induced by non-standard expansion histories. We show that both Eulerian and Lagrangian perturbation theory are capable of reproducing the Fourier space two-point functions of halos up to the non-linear scale from a suite of $4096^3$ particle N-body simulations. This is the first demonstration that perturbative models can accurately fit the redshift-space clustering of biased tracers in N-body simulations of such theories. By comparing different theoretical models and IR resummation schemes we assess the current theoretical uncertainty in predicting power spectra for models with features. Our results suggest that future surveys will be able to detect or tightly constrain features in the primordial spectrum below the one percent level across a wide range of scales.

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arXiv2020

Consistent Modeling of Velocity Statistics and Redshift-Space Distortions in One-Loop Perturbation Theory

The peculiar velocities of biased tracers of the cosmic density field contain important information about the growth of large scale structure and generate anisotropy in the observed clustering of galaxies. Using N-body data, we show that velocity expansions for halo redshift-space power spectra are converged at the percent-level at perturbative scales for most line-of-sight angles $μ$ when the first three pairwise velocity moments are included, and that the third moment is well-approximated by a counterterm-like contribution. We compute these pairwise-velocity statistics in Fourier space using both Eulerian and Lagrangian one-loop perturbation theory using a cubic bias scheme and a complete set of counterterms and stochastic contributions. We compare the models and show that our models fit both real-space velocity statistics and redshift-space power spectra for both halos and a mock sample of galaxies at sub-percent level on perturbative scales using consistent sets of parameters, making them appealing choices for the upcoming era of spectroscopic, peculiar-velocity and kSZ surveys.

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arXiv2020

The Reconstructed Power Spectrum in the Zeldovich Approximation

Density-reconstruction sharpens the baryon acoustic oscillations signal by undoing some of the smoothing incurred by nonlinear structure formation. In this paper we present an analytical model for reconstruction based on the Zeldovich approximation, which for the first time includes a complete set of counterterms and bias terms up to quadratic order and can fit real and redshift-space data pre- and post-reconstruction data in both Fourier and configuration space over a wide range of scales. We compare our model to n-body data at $z = 0$ from the {\tt DarkSky} simulation \cite{skillman14}, finding sub-percent agreement in both real space and in the redshift-space power spectrum monopole out to $k = 0.4\ h$ Mpc$^{-1}$, and out to $k = 0.2\ h$ Mpc$^{-1}$ in the quadrupole, with comparable agreement in configuration space. We compare our model with several popular existing alternatives, updating existing theoretical results for exponential damping in wiggle/no-wiggle splits of the BAO signal and discuss the usually-ignored effect of higher bias contributions on the reconstructed signal. In the appendices, we re-derive the former within our formalism, present exploratory results on higher-order corrections due to nonlinearities inherent to reconstruction, and present numerical techniques with which to calculate the redshift-space power spectrum of biased tracers within the Zeldovich approximation.

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arXiv2019

Rotation method for accelerating multiple-spherical Bessel function integrals against a numerical source function

A common problem in cosmology is to integrate the product of two or more spherical Bessel functions (sBFs) with different configuration-space arguments against the power spectrum or its square, weighted by powers of wavenumber. Naively computing them scales as $N_{\rm g}^{p+1}$ with $p$ the number of configuration space arguments and $N_{\rm g}$ the grid size, and they cannot be done with Fast Fourier Transforms (FFTs). Here we show that by rewriting the sBFs as sums of products of sine and cosine and then using the product to sum identities, these integrals can then be performed using 1-D FFTs with $N_{\rm g} \log N_{\rm g}$ scaling. This "rotation" method has the potential to accelerate significantly a number of calculations in cosmology, such as perturbation theory predictions of loop integrals, higher order correlation functions, and analytic templates for correlation function covariance matrices. We implement this approach numerically both in a free-standing, publicly-available \textsc{Python} code and within the larger, publicly-available package \texttt{mcfit}. The rotation method evaluated with direct integrations already offers a factor of 6-10$\times$ speed-up over the naive approach in our test cases. Using FFTs, which the rotation method enables, then further improves this to a speed-up of $\sim$$1000-3000\times$ over the naive approach. The rotation method should be useful in light of upcoming large datasets such as DESI or LSST. In analysing these datasets recomputation of these integrals a substantial number of times, for instance to update perturbation theory predictions or covariance matrices as the input linear power spectrum is changed, will be one piece in a Monte Carlo Markov Chain cosmological parameter search: thus the overall savings from our method should be significant.

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arXiv2019

An EFT description of galaxy intrinsic alignments

We present a general perturbative effective field theory (EFT) description of galaxy shape correlations, which are commonly known as intrinsic alignments. This rigorous approach extends current analytical modelling strategies in that it only relies on the equivalence principle. We present our results in terms of three-dimensional statistics for two- and three-point functions of both galaxy shapes and number counts. In case of the two-point function, we recover the well-known linear alignment result at leading order, but also present the full next-to-leading order expressions. In case of the three-point function we present leading order results for all the auto- and cross-correlations of galaxy shapes and densities. We use a spherical tensor basis to decompose the tensor perturbations in different helicity modes, which allows us to make use of isotropy and parity properties in the correlators. Combined with the results on projection presented in a forthcoming companion paper, our framework is directly applicable to accounting for intrinsic alignment contamination in weak lensing surveys, and to extracting cosmological information from intrinsic alignments.

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arXiv2019

Exploring redshift-space distortions in large-scale structure

We explore and compare different ways large-scale structure observables in redshift-space and real space can be connected. These include direct computation in Lagrangian space, moment expansions and two formulations of the streaming model. We derive for the first time a Fourier space version of the streaming model, which yields an algebraic relation between the real- and redshift-space power spectra which can be compared to earlier, phenomenological models. By considering the redshift-space 2-point function in both configuration and Fourier space, we show how to generalize the Gaussian streaming model to higher orders in a systematic and computationally tractable way. We present a closed-form solution to the Zeldovich power spectrum in redshift space and use this as a framework for exploring convergence properties of different expansion approaches. While we use the Zeldovich approximation to illustrate these results, much of the formalism and many of the relations we derive hold beyond perturbation theory, and could be used with ingredients measured from N-body simulations or in other areas requiring decomposition of Cartesian tensors times plane waves. We finish with a discussion of the redshift-space bispectrum, bias and stochasticity and terms in Lagrangian perturbation theory up to 1-loop order.

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arXiv2019

On Observables in a Dark Matter-Clustering Quintessence System

We consider a system where dark matter dynamics is enriched by the presence of clustering quintessence in the approximation where the system is effectively reduced to one degree of freedom. We study the corresponding observables up to one-loop order and then point out similarities between the power spectrum of the reduced system and the behaviour of non-equal time pure dark matter correlators. We then focus on the one-loop total density power spectrum in the IR limit as a diagnostic tool for consistency relations breaking. Unlike the non-equal time case, the reduced system does still obey consistency relations; we illustrate this by explicitly verifying the 1-loop IR cancellation. A more general setup, obtained by relaxing the assumption of a vanishing sound speed, is also analyzed. In this and similar scenarios the presence of additional dynamics, typical of dark energy and modified gravity models, implies that one may no longer gauge away the squeezed contribution of observables such as the dark matter bispectrum. We show how these effects propagate all the way to biased tracers.

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arXiv2018

A Tale of Two Scales: Screening in Large Scale Structure

The perturbative treatment of dark matter in structure formation relies on the existence of a well-defined expansion parameter, $k/k_{\rm NL}$, with $k_{\rm NL}$ signalling the onset and ultimately the leading role of non-linearities in the system. Cosmologies beyond the ΛCDM model often come with additional degree(s) of freedom. The scale $k_{\rm V}$ at which non-linearities become important in the additional sector(s) can be rather different from $k_{\rm NL}$. For theories endowed with a Vainshtein-type screening mechanism, $k_{\rm V}$ sets the scale where screening becomes efficient and restores continuity with the predictions of general relativity. This is precisely the dynamics that allows such theories to pass existing observational tests at scales where general relativity has been tested with exquisite precision (e.g. solar system scales). We consider here the mildly-non-linear scales of a dark matter component coupled to a galileon-type field and focus in particular on the case of a $k_{\rm V}$ < $k_{\rm NL}$ hierarchy. We put forward a phenomenological framework that describes the effects of screening dynamics on large scale structure observables.

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arXiv2018

Theoretical Systematics of Future Baryon Acoustic Oscillation Surveys

Future Baryon Acoustic Oscillation surveys aim at observing galaxy clustering over a wide range of redshift and galaxy populations at great precision, reaching tenths of a percent, in order to detect any deviation of dark energy from the $\LCDM$ model. We utilize a set of paired quasi-\Nb\, FastPM simulations that were designed to mitigate the sample variance effect on the BAO feature and evaluated the BAO systematics as precisely as $\sim 0.01\%$. We report anisotropic BAO scale shifts before and after density field reconstruction in the presence of redshift-space distortions over a wide range of redshift, galaxy/halo biases, and shot noise levels. We test different reconstruction schemes and different smoothing filter scales, and introduce physically-motivated BAO fitting models. For the first time, we derive a Galilean-invariant infrared resummed model for halos in real and redshift space. We test these models from the perspective of robust BAO measurements and non-BAO information such as growth rate and nonlinear bias. We find that pre-reconstruction BAO scale has moderate fitting-model dependence at the level of $0.1\%-0.2\%$ for matter while the dependence is substantially reduced to less than $0.07\%$ for halos. We find that post-reconstruction BAO shifts are generally reduced to below $0.1\%$ in the presence of galaxy/halo bias and show much smaller fitting model dependence. Different reconstruction conventions can potentially make a much larger difference on the line-of-sight BAO scale, upto $0.3\%$. Meanwhile, the precision (error) of the BAO measurements is quite consistent regardless of the choice of the fitting model or reconstruction convention.

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arXiv2018

Large-scale structure perturbation theory without losing stream crossing

We suggest an approach to perturbative calculations of large-scale clustering in the Universe that includes from the start the stream crossing (multiple velocities for mass elements at a single position) that is lost in traditional calculations. Starting from a functional integral over displacement, the perturbative series expansion is in deviations from (truncated) Zel'dovich evolution, with terms that can be computed exactly even for stream-crossed displacements. We evaluate the one-loop formulas for displacement and density power spectra numerically in 1D, finding dramatic improvement in agreement with N-body simulations compared to the Zel'dovich power spectrum (which is exact in 1D up to stream crossing). Beyond 1D, our approach could represent an improvement over previous expansions even aside from the inclusion of stream crossing, but we have not investigated this numerically. In the process we show how to achieve effective-theory-like regulation of small-scale fluctuations without free parameters.

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