Related papers: Constraints on the [Omega_Matter-Omega_Lambda]-pla…
We study the ellipticity of contour lines in the sky maps of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) as well as other measures of elongation. The sensitivity of the elongation on the resolution of the CMB maps which depends on the…
Upcoming galaxy surveys will allow us to probe the growth of the cosmic large-scale structure with improved sensitivity compared to current missions, and will also map larger areas of the sky. This means that in addition to the increased…
We investigate the cosmological test recently proposed by B. Fort, Y. Mellier and M. Dantel-Fort (FMD), where the observed location of the critical line in gravitational lensing is used to determine the cosmological parameters, $\Omega$ and…
We forecast the ability of future CMB and galaxy lensing surveys to constrain variations of the fine structure constant. We found that lensing data, as those expected from satellite experiments as Euclid could improve the constraint from…
The CMB is already one of the pillars of the Big Bang model. However it may also become our most powerful tool to distinguish contending models and to determine their cosmological parameters. To realize this goal, more than 20 observational…
Upcoming ground and space based observatories such as the DES, the LSST, the JDEM concepts and the SKA, promise to dramatically increase the size of strong gravitational lens samples. A significant fraction of the systems are expected to be…
We consider the problem of determining the Galaxy's gravitational potential from a star catalogue. We show that orbit-based approaches to this problem suffer from unacceptable numerical noise deriving from the use of only a finite number of…
We use the Millennium Galaxy Catalogue (MGC) to study the effect of compact galaxies on the local field galaxy luminosity function. Here we observationally define as `compact' galaxies that are too small to be reliably distinguished from…
Galaxy redshift surveys provide a distorted picture of the universe due to the non-Hubble component of galaxy motions. By measuring such distortions in the linear regime one can constrain the quantity $\beta = \Omega^{0.6}/b$ where $\Omega$…
We use statistical inference theory to explore the constraints from future galaxy weak lensing (cosmic shear) surveys combined with the current CMB constraints on cosmological parameters, focusing particularly on the running of the spectral…
Peak statistics in weak lensing maps access the non-Gaussian information contained in the large-scale distribution of matter in the Universe. They are therefore a promising complement to two-point and higher-order statistics to constrain…
Galaxy-galaxy lensing is an essential tool for probing dark matter halos and constraining cosmological parameters. While galaxy-galaxy lensing measurements usually rely on shear, weak-lensing magnification contains additional constraining…
We investigate how the lensing potential can be measured tomographically with future galaxy surveys using their number counts. Such a measurement is an independent test of the standard $\Lambda$CDM framework and can be used to discern…
We compare and combine likelihood functions of the cosmological parameters Omega_m, h and sigma_8 from the CMB, type Ia supernovae and from probes of large scale structure. We include the recent results from the CMB experiments BOOMERANG…
In this paper we present a scale free method to determine the cosmological parameters (Omega_m, Omega_Lambda). The method is based on the requirement of isotropy of the distribution of orientations of cosmological filaments. The current…
This paper advances a general proposal for testing non-standard cosmological models by means of observational relations of cosmological point sources in some specific waveband, and their use in the context of the data provided by the galaxy…
Measurements of the cosmological density parameter Omega using techniques that exploit the gravity-induced motions of galaxies constrain, in linear perturbation theory, the degenerate parameter combination beta = Omega^{0.6}/b, where the…
Galaxy number counts in the $K$-, $H$-, $I$-, $R$-, $B$- and $U$-bands from the Durham Extragalactic Astronomy and Cosmology catalogue could be well-fitted over their whole range using luminosity function (LF) parameters derived from the…
The possibility of detecting weak lensing effects from deep wide field imaging surveys has open new means of probing the large-scale structures of the Universe and measuring cosmological parameters. In this paper we present a systematic…
The study of the magnification bias produced on high-redshift sub-millimetre galaxies by foreground galaxies through the analysis of the cross-correlation function was recently demonstrated as an interesting independent alternative to the…