Related papers: The Incidence of Strong-Lensing Clusters in the Re…
The galaxy cluster IDCS J1426.5+3508 at z = 1.75 is the most massive galaxy cluster yet discovered at z > 1.4 and the first cluster at this epoch for which the Sunyaev-Zel'Dovich effect has been observed. In this paper we report on the…
The Red-Sequence Cluster Survey (RCS) is a new galaxy cluster survey designed to provide a large sample of optically selected 0.1$<$z$<$1.4 clusters. The planned survey data are 100 square degrees of two color ($R$ and $z'$) imaging, with a…
We present a description of the observations and data reduction procedures for an extensive spectroscopic and multi-band photometric study of nine high redshift, optically-selected cluster candidates. The primary goal of the survey is to…
We study the efficiency of numerically simulated galaxy clusters for producing strong gravitational lensing events in different dark-energy cosmologies with constant and time-variable equation of state and we compare it with ``standard''…
We quantify the uncertainty in weak lensing mass estimates of clusters of galaxies, caused by distant (uncorrelated) large scale structure along the line of sight. We find that the effect is fairly small for deep observations (20<R<26) of…
We present the Red-sequence Cluster Lensing Survey (RCSLenS), an application of the methods developed for the Canada France Hawaii Telescope Lensing Survey (CFHTLenS) to the ~785deg$^2$, multi-band imaging data of the Red-sequence Cluster…
Weak lensing surveys are emerging as an important tool for the construction of "mass selected" clusters of galaxies. We evaluate both the efficiency and completeness of a weak lensing selection by combining a dense, complete redshift…
{}From the lensing properties of a numerically simulated cluster, from the statistical properties of the giant arcs produced by the cluster, and from comparing the cluster properties derived both from lensing and from the X-ray properties…
We compare galaxy number counts in HST/ACS fields containing moderate-redshift (0.2<z<1.0) strong gravitational lenses with those in two control samples: (1) the first square degree of the COSMOS survey, comprising 259 ACS fields and (2) 20…
Galaxy clusters identified with optical imaging tend to suffer from projection effects, which impact richness (the number of member galaxies in a cluster) and lensing coherently. Physically unassociated galaxies can be mistaken as cluster…
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 calculate the all-sky number of galaxy clusters that are expected to be gravitationally lensed by foreground massive clusters. We describe the redshift and number distributions of clusters using a Press-Schechter analysis, and model the…
We carry out a detailed strong lensing analysis of a sub-sample of eight galaxy clusters of the CLASH survey, in the redshift range of $ z_{\rm cluster} = [0.23-0.59]$, using extensive spectroscopic information, primarily MUSE archival data…
Strong gravitational lensing by galaxy clusters magnifies background galaxies, enhancing our ability to discover statistically significant samples of galaxies at z>6, in order to constrain the high-redshift galaxy luminosity functions.…
We present the results of a weak lensing survey of six high-redshift (z > 0.5), X-ray selected clusters of galaxies. We have obtained ultra-deep R-band images of each cluster with the Keck Telescope, and have measured a weak lensing signal…
[abridged] We present a first cosmological analysis of a refined cluster catalog from the Red-Sequence Cluster Survey (RCS). The input cluster sample is derived from 72.07 square degrees of imaging data [...] The catalog contains 956…
We carry out ray tracing through five high resolution simulations of a galaxy cluster to study how its ability to produce giant gravitationally lensed arcs is influenced by the collision cross-section of its dark matter. In three cases…
We report weak-lensing masses for 51 of the most X-ray luminous galaxy clusters known. This cluster sample, introduced earlier in this series of papers, spans redshifts 0.15 < z_cl < 0.7, and is well suited to calibrate mass proxies for…
Cluster gravitational lensing surveys like the Hubble Space Telescope Frontier Fields survey will detect distant galaxies 10-50 times fainter than any yet discovered. Using these surveys to measure the luminosity function of such faint,…
We present deep I, J_s, K_s imaging and optical spectroscopy of the newly discovered Red-Sequence Cluster Survey cluster RCS043938-2904.9. This cluster, drawn from an extensive preliminary list, was selected for detailed study on the basis…