Data compression and covariance matrix inspection: cosmic shear

Physical Review D American Physical Society 103:10 (2021) 103535

Authors:

Tassia Ferreira, Tianqing Zhang, Nianyi Chen, Scott Dodelson

Abstract:

Covariance matrices are among the most difficult pieces of end-to-end cosmological analyses. In principle, for two-point functions, each component involves a four-point function, and the resulting covariance often has hundreds of thousands of elements. We investigate various compression mechanisms capable of vastly reducing the size of the covariance matrix in the context of cosmic shear statistics. This helps identify which of its parts are most crucial to parameter estimation. We start with simple compression methods, by isolating and “removing” 200 modes associated with the lowest eigenvalues, then those with the lowest signal-to-noise ratio, before moving on to more sophisticated schemes like compression at the tomographic level and, finally, with the massively optimized parameter estimation and data compression (MOPED). We find that, while most of these approaches prove useful for a few parameters of interest, like Ωm, the simplest yield a loss of constraining power on the intrinsic alignment (IA) parameters as well as S8. For the case considered—cosmic shear from the first year of data from the Dark Energy Survey—only MOPED was able to replicate the original constraints in the 16-parameter space. Finally, we apply a tolerance test to the elements of the compressed covariance matrix obtained with MOPED and confirm that the IA parameter AIA is the most susceptible to inaccuracies in the covariance matrix.

The growth of density perturbations in the last $\sim$10 billion years from tomographic large-scale structure data

(2021)

Authors:

Carlos García-García, Jaime Ruiz Zapatero, David Alonso, Emilio Bellini, Pedro G Ferreira, Eva-Maria Mueller, Andrina Nicola, Pilar Ruiz-Lapuente

The hybrid radio/X-ray correlation of the black hole transient MAXI J1348-630

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press 505:1 (2021) L58-L63

Authors:

F Carotenuto, S Corbel, E Tremou, Td Russell, A Tzioumis, Rp Fender, Pa Woudt, Se Motta, Jca Miller-Jones, Aj Tetarenko, Gr Sivakoff

Abstract:

Black hole (BH) low mass X-ray binaries in their hard spectral state are found to display two different correlations between the radio emission from the compact jets and the X-ray emission from the inner accretion flow. Here, we present a large data set of quasi-simultaneous radio and X-ray observations of the recently discovered accreting BH MAXI J1348–630 during its 2019/2020 outburst. Our results span almost six orders of magnitude in X-ray luminosity, allowing us to probe the accretion–ejection coupling from the brightest to the faintest phases of the outburst. We find that MAXI J1348–630 belongs to the growing population of outliers at the highest observed luminosities. Interestingly, MAXI J1348–630 deviates from the outlier track at LX ≲ 7 × 1035(D/2.2  kpc)2 erg s−1 and ultimately rejoins the standard track at LX ≃ 1033(D/2.2 kpc)2 erg s−1, displaying a hybrid radio/X-ray correlation, observed only in a handful of sources. However, for MAXI J1348–630 these transitions happen at luminosities much lower than what observed for similar sources (at least an order of magnitude). We discuss the behaviour of MAXI J1348–630 in light of the currently proposed scenarios and highlight the importance of future deep monitorings of hybrid correlation sources, especially close to the transitions and in the low luminosity regime.

The Varying Kinematics of Multiple Ejecta from the Black Hole X-ray Binary MAXI J1820+070

(2021)

Authors:

CM Wood, JCA Miller-Jones, J Homan, JS Bright, SE Motta, RP Fender, S Markoff, TM Belloni, EG Körding, D Maitra, S Migliari, DM Russell, TD Russell, CL Sarazin, R Soria, AJ Tetarenko, V Tudose

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: stellar population and structural trends across the Fundamental Plane

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press (OUP) 504:4 (2021) 5098-5130

Authors:

Francesco D’Eugenio, Matthew Colless, Nicholas Scott, Arjen van der Wel, Roger L Davies, Jesse van de Sande, Sarah M Sweet, Sree Oh, Brent Groves, Rob Sharp, Matt S Owers, Joss Bland-Hawthorn, Scott M Croom, Sarah Brough, Julia J Bryant, Michael Goodwin, Jon S Lawrence, Nuria PF Lorente, Samuel N Richards