Related papers: Cosmic Error and the Statistics of Large Scale Str…
Future high-resolution microwave background measurements hold the promise of detecting galaxy clusters throughout our Hubble volume through their Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) signature, down to a given limiting flux. The number density of galaxy…
Weak gravitational lensing has the potential to constrain cosmological parameters to high precision. However, as shown by the Shear TEsting Programmes (STEP) and GRavitational lEnsing Accuracy Testing (GREAT) Challenges, measuring galaxy…
We study statistical properties of galaxy structures in several samples extracted from the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey. In particular, we measured conditional fluctuations by means of the scale-length method and determined their probability…
In this paper we investigate the impact that realistic scale-dependence systematic effects may have on cosmic shear tomography. We model spatially varying residual ellipticity and size variations in weak lensing measurements and propagate…
We identify and study a previously unknown systematic effect on cosmic shear measurements, caused by the selection of galaxies used for shape measurement, in particular the rejection of close (blended) galaxy pairs. We use ray-tracing…
We present constraints on the evolution of large-scale structure from a catalog of 710,000 galaxies with I_AB <= 24 derived from a KPNO 4m CCD imaging survey of a contiguous 4 deg x 4 deg region. The advantage of using large contiguous…
We investigate number count statistics as measures for transition to homogeneity of the matter distribution in the Universe and analyse how such statistics might be `dressed' by the assumed survey selection function. Since the estimated…
In the very near future, weak lensing surveys will map the projected density of the universe in an unbiased way over large regions of the sky. In order to interpret the results of studies it is helpful to develop an understanding of the…
Redshift-space clustering anisotropies caused by cosmic peculiar velocities provide a powerful probe to test the gravity theory on large scales. However, to extract unbiased physical constraints, the clustering pattern has to be modelled…
Studying galaxies at different cosmic epochs entails several observational effects that need to be taken into account to compare populations across a large time span in a consistent manner. We use a sample of 166 nearby galaxies that hosted…
The clustering of galaxies observed in future redshift surveys will provide a wealth of cosmological information. Matching the signal at different redshifts constrains the dark energy driving the acceleration of the expansion of the…
Observational astronomy is plagued with selection effects that must be taken into account when interpreting data from astronomical surveys. Because of the physical limitations of observing time and instrument sensitivity, datasets are…
We use numerical simulations to investigate the behaviour of the dipole moment of the spatial distribution of different kinds of mass tracers. We select density peaks of the simulated matter distribution with mean separations of 38 and 30…
Cosmological weak lensing gives rise to correlations in the ellipticities of faint galaxies. This cosmic shear signal depends upon the matter power spectrum, thus providing a means to constrain cosmological parameters. It has recently been…
We investigate the impact of the observed correlation between a galaxies shape and its surrounding density field on the measurement of third order weak lensing shear statistics. Using numerical simulations, we estimate the systematic error…
In the upcoming era of high-precision galaxy surveys, it becomes necessary to understand the impact of redshift uncertainties on cosmological observables. In this paper we explore the effect of sub-percent photometric redshift errors…
We develop a general method to "self-calibrate" observations of galaxy clustering with respect to systematics associated with photometric calibration errors. We first point out the danger posed by the multiplicative effect of calibration…
We study the impact of systematic errors on planned weak lensing surveys and compute the requirements on their contributions so that they are not a dominant source of the cosmological parameter error budget. The generic types of error we…
The multipole moments of the power spectrum of large scale structure, observed in redshift space, are calculated for a finite sample volume including the effects of both the linear velocity field and geometry. A variance calculation is also…
We discuss the effects of finite sky coverage and the uncertainty in extracting information about the power spectrum from experiments on small angular scales. In general the cosmic variance is enhanced by a factor of $4\pi/A$, where $A$ is…