Related papers: Spin induced galaxy alignments and their implicati…
Alignments in the angular momentum vectors of galaxies can induce large scale correlations in their projected orientations. Such alignments arise from the tidal torques exerted on neighboring proto-galaxies by the smoothly varying shear…
It has recently been argued that the observed ellipticities of galaxies may be determined at least in part by the primordial tidal gravitational field in which the galaxy formed. Long-range correlations in the tidal field could thus lead to…
Weak gravitational lensing is now established as a powerful method to measure mass fluctuations in the universe. It relies on the measurement of small coherent distortions of the images of background galaxies. Even low-level correlations in…
Intrinsic alignments of galaxies are recognised as one of the most important systematic in weak lensing surveys on small angular scales. In this paper we investigate ellipticity correlation functions that are measured separately on…
It has recently been argued that the observed ellipticities of galaxies may be determined at least in part by the primordial tidal gravitational field in which the galaxy formed. Long-range correlations in the tidal field could thus lead to…
The subject of this paper is to build a physical model describing shape and size correlations of galaxies due to weak gravitational lensing and due to direct tidal interaction of elliptical galaxies with gravitational fields sourced by the…
We explore the possibility that an intrinsic correlation between galaxy ellipticities arising during the galaxy formation process may account for part of the shear signal recently reported by several groups engaged in weak lensing surveys.…
Gravitational lensing causes background galaxy images to become aligned, and the statistical characteristics of the image alignments can then be used to constrain the power spectrum of mass fluctuations. Analyses of gravitational lensing…
Subject of this paper is the weak lensing effect on galaxies that show intrinsically correlated ellipticities. In our model, we investigate the distortion of the ellipticity field if the galaxies experience an apparent shift in their…
Accurate measurements of the cosmic shear signal require a separation of the true weak gravitational lensing signal from intrinsic shape correlations of galaxies. These `intrinsic alignments' of galaxies originate from galaxy formation…
We show with analytic models that the assumption of uncorrelated intrinsic ellipticities of target sources that is usually made in searches for weak gravitational lensing due to large-scale mass inhomogeneities (``field lensing'') is…
Cosmic shear surveys have great promise as tools for precision cosmology, but can be subject to systematic errors including intrinsic ellipticity correlations of the source galaxies. The intrinsic alignments are believed to be small for…
We investigate a physical, composite alignment model for both spiral and elliptical galaxies and its impact on cosmological parameter estimation from weak lensing for a tomographic survey. Ellipticity correlation functions and angular…
Intrinsic alignments are believed to be a major source of systematics for future generation of weak gravitational lensing surveys like Euclid or LSST. Direct measurements of the alignment of the projected light distribution of galaxies in…
We investigate the expected correlation between the weak gravitational shear of distant galaxies and the orientation of foreground galaxies, through the use of numerical simulations. This shear-ellipticity correlation can mimic a…
Alignments of spiral galaxies were thought to result from tidal torquing, where tidal field of the cosmic large-scale structure exert torquing moments onto dark matter haloes, determining their angular momentum and ultimately the…
Subject of this paper are intrinsic ellipticity correlations between galaxies, their statistical properties, their observability with future surveys and their interference with weak gravitational lensing measurements. Using an angular…
Galaxy intrinsic alignment can be a severe source of error in weak-lensing studies. The problem has been widely studied by numerical simulations and with heuristic models, but without a clear theoretical justification of its origin and…
Galaxy shapes are not randomly oriented, rather they are statistically aligned in a way that can depend on formation environment, history and galaxy type. Studying the alignment of galaxies can therefore deliver important information about…
Intrinsic galaxy alignments constitute the major astrophysical systematic of forthcoming weak gravitational lensing surveys but also yield unique insights into galaxy formation and evolution. We build analytic models for the distribution of…