Selection biases in empirical p(z) methods for weak lensing [electronic resource].
- Published:
- Washington, D.C. : United States. Dept. of Energy, 2017.
Oak Ridge, Tenn. : Distributed by the Office of Scientific and Technical Information, U.S. Dept. of Energy - Physical Description:
- pages 769-782 : digital, PDF file
- Additional Creators:
- United States. Department of Energy, National Aeronautics and Space Administration Announcement, and United States. Department of Energy. Office of Scientific and Technical Information
Access Online
- Restrictions on Access:
- Free-to-read Unrestricted online access
- Summary:
- To measure the mass of foreground objects with weak gravitational lensing, one needs to estimate the redshift distribution of lensed background sources. This is commonly done in an empirical fashion, i.e. with a reference sample of galaxies of known spectroscopic redshift, matched to the source population. In this paper, we develop a simple decision tree framework that, under the ideal conditions of a large, purely magnitude-limited reference sample, allows an unbiased recovery of the source redshift probability density function p(z), as a function of magnitude and colour. We use this framework to quantify biases in empirically estimated p(z) caused by selection effects present in realistic reference and weak lensing source catalogues, namely (1) complex selection of reference objects by the targeting strategy and success rate of existing spectroscopic surveys and (2) selection of background sources by the success of object detection and shape measurement at low signal to noise. For intermediate-to-high redshift clusters, and for depths and filter combinations appropriate for ongoing lensing surveys, we find that (1) spectroscopic selection can cause biases above the 10 per cent level, which can be reduced to ≈5 per cent by optimal lensing weighting, while (2) selection effects in the shape catalogue bias mass estimates at or below the 2 per cent level. Finally, this illustrates the importance of completeness of the reference catalogues for empirical redshift estimation.
- Report Numbers:
- E 1.99:1361132
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- Other Subject(s):
- Note:
- Published through SciTech Connect.
02/23/2017.
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 468 1 ISSN 0035-8711 AM
D. Gruen; F. Brimioulle.
SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
Stanford Univ., CA (United States) - Funding Information:
- AC02-76SF00515
PF5-160138
View MARC record | catkey: 23495238