Related papers: A new parameter space study of cosmological microl…
Gravitational Lensing is a UNIQUE tool to constrain the mass distribution of collapsed structures, this is particularly true for galaxies, either on a case by case basis using multiple images of background sources (such as quasars), or…
Weak lensing can be observed through a number of effects on the images of distant galaxies; their shapes are sheared, their sizes and fluxes (magnitudes) are magnified and their positions on the sky are modified by the lensing field. Galaxy…
At any instant, there are roughly 1000 ongoing microlensing events to sources brighter than 20th magnitude in the Milky Way Galaxy. Large-scale maps of the microlensing optical depth and the mean timescale are constructed for a number of…
We propose to use a simple observable, the fractional area of "hot spots" in weak gravitational lensing mass maps which are detected with high significance, to determine background cosmological parameters. Because these high-convergence…
We present a forecast analysis on the feasibility of measuring the cosmological parameters with a large number of galaxy-galaxy scale strong gravitational lensing systems. Future wide area surveys are expected to discover and measure the…
The first investigations of the response of the microlensing magnification pattern (at an optical depth of order unity) to the mass function of the microlenses found that the resulting statistics depend only on the mean microlens mass <m>.…
Microlensing is a powerful technique which can be used to study the continuum and the broad line emitting regions in distant AGNs. After a brief description of the methods and required data, we present recent applications of this technique.…
We present a joint estimate of the stellar/dark matter mass fraction in lens galaxies and the average size of the accretion disk of lensed quasars from microlensing measurements of 27 quasar image pairs seen through 19 lens galaxies. The…
Since the first microlensing planet discovery in 2003, more than 200 planets have been detected with gravitational microlensing, in addition to several free-floating planet and black hole candidates. In this chapter the microlensing theory…
Cosmic shear is the distortion of images of distant galaxies due to weak gravitational lensing by the large-scale structure in the Universe. Such images are coherently deformed by the tidal field of matter inhomogeneities along the line of…
Several gravitationally lensed quasars are observed with anomalous magnifications in pairs of images that straddle a critical curve. Simple theoretical arguments suggest that the magnification of these images should be approximately…
Gravitational lensing has emerged as a powerful probe of the matter distribution on subgalactic scales, which itself may contain important clues about the fundamental origins and properties of dark matter. Broadly speaking, two different…
Weak gravitational lensing is a promising tool for the study of the mass distribution in the Universe. Here we report some partial results that show how lensing maps can be used to differentiate between cosmological models. We pay special…
The purpose of the present work is the study of focusing properties of atmospheres of substars that is necessary for adequate interpreting of observational data and for solving the inverse problem consisting in recovery parameters of…
Large scale structure deflects cosmic microwave background (CMB) photons. Since large angular scales in the large scale structure contribute significantly to the gravitational lensing effect, a realistic simulation of CMB lensing requires a…
Gravitational microlensing provides a new technique for studying the surfaces of distant stars. Microlensing events are detected in real time and can be followed up with precision photometry and spectroscopy. This method is particularly…
In Paper I we studied the theory of gravitational microlensing for a planar distribution of point masses. In this second paper, we extend the analysis to a three-dimensional lens distribution. First we study the lensing properties of…
Strong lensing has developed into an important astrophysical tool for probing both cosmology and galaxies (their structure, formation, and evolution). Using the gravitational lensing theory and cluster mass distribution model, we try to…
A grand challenge of the 21st century cosmology is to accurately estimate the cosmological parameters of our Universe. A major approach to estimating the cosmological parameters is to use the large-scale matter distribution of the Universe.…
In these lectures I give an overview of gravitational lensing, concentrating on theoretical aspects, including derivations of some of the important results. Topics covered include the determination of surface mass densities of intervening…