Related papers: Sharp parameter bounds for certain maximal point l…
A well-studied maximal gravitational point lens construction of S. H. Rhie produces $5n$ images of a light source using $n+1$ deflector masses. The construction arises from a circular, symmetric deflector configuration on $n$ masses…
It has been conjectured (astro-ph/0103463) that a gravitational lens consisting of n point masses can not produce more than 5(n-1) images as is known to be the case for n = 2 and 3. The reasoning is based on the number of finite limit…
We consider gravitational lensing of a background source by a finite system of point-masses. The problem of determining the maximum possible number of lensed images has been completely resolved in the single-plane setting (where the point…
Gravitational lensing can be by a faint star, a trillion stars of a galaxy, or a cluster of galaxies, and this poses a familiar struggle between particle method and mean field method. In a bottom-up approach, a puzzle has been laid on…
We impose the first strong-lensing constraints on a wide class of modified gravity models where an extra field that modifies gravity also couples to photons (either directly or indirectly through a coupling with baryons) and thus modifies…
Quantifying image distortions caused by strong gravitational lensing and estimating the corresponding matter distribution in lensing galaxies has been primarily performed by maximum likelihood modeling of observations. This is typically a…
Since upcoming telescopes will observe thousands of strong lensing systems, creating fully-automated analysis pipelines for these images becomes increasingly important. In this work, we make a step towards that direction by developing the…
The total amplification of a source inside a caustic curve of a binary lens is no less than 3. Here we show that the infimum amplification 3 is satisfied by a family of binary lenses where the source position is at the mid-point between the…
Over the past decade advancements in the understanding of several astrophysical phenomena have allowed us to infer a concordance cosmological model that successfully accounts for most of the observations of our universe. This has opened up…
In the coming years, a new generation of sky surveys, in particular, Euclid Space Telescope (2022), and the Rubin Observatory's Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST, 2023) will discover more than 200,000 new strong gravitational lenses,…
In this work are reviewed several aspects of gravitational lensing produced by astrophysical bodies that strongly curve the spacetime in their vicinity. When an object with a photon sphere (e.g. a black hole) is interposed between a source…
The large number of strong lenses discoverable in future astronomical surveys will likely enhance the value of strong gravitational lensing as a cosmic probe of dark energy and dark matter. However, leveraging the increased statistical…
The total magnification due to a point lens has been of particular interest as the theorem that gravitational lensing results in light amplification for all observers appears to contradict the conservation of photon number. This has been…
Strong gravitational lensing of an extended object is described by a mapping from source to image coordinates that is nonlinear and cannot generally be inverted analytically. Determining the structure of the source intensity distribution…
We recently hypothesized that a distortion parameter exists such that its signed sum for all images of singular gravitational lensing of a source vanishes identically [K. S. Virbhadra, Phys. Rev. D {\bf 106}, 064038 (2022)]. We found a…
Current ground-based cosmological surveys, such as the Dark Energy Survey (DES), are predicted to discover thousands of galaxy-scale strong lenses, while future surveys, such as the Vera Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time…
We discuss the contribution to the characteristic lensing quantities, i.e. the deflection angle and Einstein radius, due to the higher order terms (e.g. the gravitomagnetic terms) considered in the lens potential. The cases we analyze are…
Strong lensing of background galaxies provides important information about the matter distribution around lens galaxies. Traditional modelling of such strong lenses is both time and resource intensive. Fast and automated analysis methods…
Recent methods for 3D reconstruction and rendering increasingly benefit from end-to-end optimization of the entire image formation process. However, this approach is currently limited: effects of the optical hardware stack and in particular…
Gravitational lensing is the phenomenon arising when light rays are deflected by the mass between the source and the observer. Largely magnified and highly distorted images of background galaxies are formed by these angular deflections if…