Related papers: What is the largest Einstein radius in the univers…
We present results from strong-lens modelling of 10,000 SDSS clusters, to establish the universal distribution of Einstein radii. Detailed lensing analyses have shown that the inner mass distribution of clusters can be accurately modelled…
The Einstein radius (ER) of a gravitational lens encodes information about decisive quantities such as halo mass, concentration, triaxiality, and orientation with respect to the observer. Thus, the largest Einstein radii can potentially be…
Based on techniques developed in the previous papers of this series, we investigate the impact of galaxy-cluster mergers on the order statistics of the largest Einstein radii. We show that the inclusion of mergers significantly shifts the…
The Einstein radius of a cluster provides a relatively model-independent measure of the mass density of a cluster within a projected radius of ~ 150 kpc, large enough to be relatively unaffected by gas physics. We show that the observed…
We present the results of a strong-lensing analysis of a complete sample of 12 very luminous X-ray clusters at $z>0.5$ using HST/ACS images. Our modelling technique has uncovered some of the largest known critical curves outlined by many…
We provide a quantitative assessment of the probability distribution function of the concentration parameter of galaxy clusters. We do so by using the probability distribution function of halo formation times, calculated by means of the…
In this paper we investigate the strong lensing statistics in galaxy clusters. We extract dark matter haloes from the Millennium-XXL simulation, compute their Einstein radius distribution, and find a very good agreement with Monte Carlo…
For more than a decade now, it has been controversial whether or not the high rate of giant gravitational arcs and the largest observed Einstein radii are consistent with the standard cosmological model. Recent studies indicate that mergers…
Gravitational lens modeling is presented for the first discovered example of a three-component source for which each component is quadruply imaged. The lens is a massive galaxy member of the cluster Cl J0152.7-1357 at z ~ 0.84. Taking…
In the era of large surveys, yielding thousands of galaxy clusters, efficient mass proxies at all scales are necessary in order to fully utilize clusters as cosmological probes. At the cores of strong lensing clusters, the Einstein radius…
We assess a claim that observed galaxy clusters with mass ~10^14 Msun are more centrally concentrated than predicted in LCDM. We generate mock strong gravitational lensing observations, taking the lenses from a cosmological hydrodynamical…
A deep spectrum taken with the Echelle Spectrograph and Imager (ESI) at the Keck II Telescope as part of the Lenses Structure and Dynamics (LSD) Survey reveals the redshifts of the extremely red source of the radio Einstein Ring in the…
The statistics of Einstein radii for a sample of strong lenses can provide valuable constraints on the underlying mass distribution. The correct interpretation, however, relies critically on the modelling of the selection of the sample,…
We study density cusps in the center of clusters of galaxies to reconcile X-ray mass estimates with gravitational lensing masses. For various mass density models with cusps we compute X-ray surface brightness distribution, and fit them to…
We present a statistical analysis of a sample of 20 strong lensing clusters drawn from the Local Cluster Substructure Survey (LoCuSS), based on high resolution Hubble Space Telescope imaging of the cluster cores and follow-up spectroscopic…
We describe ten strong lensing galaxy clusters of redshift 0.26-0.56 that were found in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. We present measurements of richness, mass and velocity dispersion for the clusters. We find that in order to use the…
We report the discovery of an almost complete Einstein ring of diameter 10" in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release 5 (DR5). Spectroscopic data from the 6m telescope of the Special Astrophysical Observatory reveals that the…
We report the discovery of a partial Einstein ring of radius 1.48arcsec produced by a massive (and seemingly isolated) elliptical galaxy. The spectroscopic follow-up at the VLT reveals a 2L* galaxy at z=0.986, which is lensing a…
Since galaxy clusters sit at the high-end of the mass function, the number of galaxy clusters both massive and concentrated enough to yield particularly large Einstein radii poses useful constraints on cosmological and structure formation…
A long-standing problem of strong lensing by galaxy clusters regards the observed high rate of giant gravitational arcs as compared to the predictions in the framework of the "standard" cosmological model. Recently, few other…