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Black Hole

Lensing of space time around a black hole. At Oxford we study black holes observationally and theoretically on all size and time scales - it is some of our core work.

Credit: ALAIN RIAZUELO, IAP/UPMC/CNRS. CLICK HERE TO VIEW MORE IMAGES.

Professor Pedro Ferreira

Professor of Astrophysics

Research theme

  • Particle astrophysics & cosmology

Sub department

  • Astrophysics

Research groups

  • Beecroft Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology
pedro.ferreira@physics.ox.ac.uk
Telephone: 01865 (2)73366
Denys Wilkinson Building, room 757
  • About
  • Publications

SYREN-NEW: Precise formulae for the linear and nonlinear matter power spectra with massive neutrinos and dynamical dark energy

Astronomy & Astrophysics EDP Sciences 698 (2025) ARTN A1

Authors:

Ce Sui, Deaglan J Bartlett, Shivam Pandey, Harry Desmond, Pedro G Ferreira, Benjamin D Wandelt

Abstract:

<jats:p><jats:italic>Context.</jats:italic> Current and future large-scale structure surveys aim to constrain the neutrino mass and the equation of state of dark energy. To do this efficiently, rapid yet accurate evaluation of the matter power spectrum in the presence of these effects is essential.</jats:p> <jats:p><jats:italic>Aims.</jats:italic> We aim to construct accurate and interpretable symbolic approximations of the linear and nonlinear matter power spectra as a function of cosmological parameters in extended ΛCDM models that contain massive neutrinos and nonconstant equations of state for dark energy. This constitutes an extension of the S<jats:sc>YREN-HALOFIT</jats:sc> emulators to incorporate these two effects, which we call S<jats:sc>YREN-NEW</jats:sc> (SYmbolic-Regression-ENhanced power spectrum emulator with NEutrinos and <jats:italic>W</jats:italic><jats:sub>0</jats:sub>−<jats:italic>w</jats:italic><jats:sub><jats:italic>a</jats:italic></jats:sub>). We also wish to obtain a simple approximation of the derived parameter, <jats:italic>σ</jats:italic><jats:sub>8</jats:sub>, as a function of the cosmological parameters for these models.</jats:p> <jats:p><jats:italic>Methods.</jats:italic> We utilizedd symbolic regression to efficiently search through candidate analytic expressions to approximate the various quantities of interest. Our results for the linear power spectrum are designed to emulate C<jats:sc>LASS</jats:sc>, whereas for the nonlinear case we aim to match the results of E<jats:sc>UCLIDEMULATOR</jats:sc>2. We compared our results to existing emulators and <jats:italic>N</jats:italic>-body simulations.</jats:p> <jats:p><jats:italic>Results.</jats:italic> Our analytic emulators for <jats:italic>σ</jats:italic><jats:sub>8</jats:sub>, and the linear and nonlinear power spectra achieve root mean squared errors of 0.1%, 0.3%, and 1.3%, respectively, across a wide range of cosmological parameters, redshifts and wavenumbers. The error on the nonlinear power spectrum is reduced by approximately a factor of 2 when considering observationally plausible dark energy models and neutrino masses. We verify that emulator-related discrepancies are subdominant compared to observational errors and other modeling uncertainties when computing shear power spectra for LSST-like surveys. Our expressions have similar accuracy to existing (numerical) emulators, but are at least an order of magnitude faster, both on a CPU and a GPU.</jats:p> <jats:p><jats:italic>Conclusions.</jats:italic> Our work greatly improves the accuracy, speed, and applicability range of current symbolic approximations of the linear and nonlinear matter power spectra. These now cover the same range of cosmological models as many numerical emulators with similar accuracy, but are much faster and more interpretable. We provide publicly available code for all symbolic approximations found.</jats:p>

Robustness of dark energy phenomenology across different parameterizations

Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics IOP Publishing 2025:05 (2025) 034

Authors:

William J Wolf, Carlos García-García, Pedro G Ferreira

Abstract:

The recent evidence for dynamical dark energy from DESI, in combination with other cosmological data, has generated significant interest in understanding the nature of dark energy and its underlying microphysics. However, interpreting these results critically depends on how dark energy is parameterized. This paper examines the robustness of conclusions about the viability of particular kinds of dynamical dark energy models to the choice of parameterization, focusing on four popular two-parameter families: the Chevallier-Polarski-Linder (CPL), Jassal-Bagla-Padmanabhan (JBP), Barboza-Alcaniz (BA), and exponential (EXP) parameterizations. We find that conclusions regarding the viability of minimally and non-minimally coupled quintessence models are independent of the parameterization adopted. We demonstrate this both by mapping these dark energy models into the (w 0, wa ) parameter space defined by these various parameterizations and by showing that all of these parameterizations can equivalently account for the phenomenology predicted by these dark energy models to a high degree of accuracy.

Robustness of dark energy phenomenology across different parameterizations

(2025)

Authors:

William J Wolf, Carlos García-García, Pedro G Ferreira

Euclid

Astronomy & Astrophysics EDP Sciences 697 (2025) ARTN A2

Authors:

Ms Cropper, A Al-Bahlawan, J Amiaux, S Awan, R Azzollini, K Benson, M Berthe, J Boucher, E Bozzo, C Brockley-Blatt, Gp Candini, C Cara, Ra Chaudery, Re Cole, P Danto, J Denniston, Am Di Giorgio, B Dryer, J-P Dubois, J Endicott, M Farina, E Galli, L Genolet, Jpd Gow, P Guttridge, M Hailey, D Hall, C Harper, H Hoekstra, Ad Holland, B Horeau, D Hu, Re James, A Khalil, R King, T Kitching, R Kohley, C Larcheveque, A Lawrenson, P Liebing, Sj Liu, J Martignac, R Massey, Hj McCracken, L Miller, N Murray, R Nakajima, S-M Niemi, Jw Nightingale, S Paltani

Abstract:

This paper presents the specification, design, and development of the Visible Camera (VIS) on the European Space Agency’s Euclid mission. VIS is a large optical-band imager with a field of view of 0.54 deg2 sampled at 000 . 1 with an array of 609 Megapixels and a spatial resolution of 000 . 18. It will be used to survey approximately 14 000 deg2 of extragalactic sky to measure the distortion of galaxies in the redshift range z = 0.1–1.5 resulting from weak gravitational lensing, one of the two principal cosmology probes leveraged by Euclid. With photometric redshifts, the distribution of dark matter can be mapped in three dimensions, and the extent to which this has changed with look-back time can be used to constrain the nature of dark energy and theories of gravity. The entire VIS focal plane will be transmitted to provide the largest images of the Universe from space to date, specified to reach mAB ≥ 24.5 with a signal-to-noise ratio S/N ≥ 10 in a single broad IE ≃ (r + i + z) band over a six-year survey. The particularly challenging aspects of the instrument are the control and calibration of observational biases, which lead to stringent performance requirements and calibration regimes. With its combination of spatial resolution, calibration knowledge, depth, and area covering most of the extra-Galactic sky, VIS will also provide a legacy data set for many other fields. This paper discusses the rationale behind the conception of VIS and describes the instrument design and development, before reporting the prelaunch performance derived from ground calibrations and brief results from the in-orbit commissioning. VIS should reach fainter than mAB = 25 with S/N ≥ 10 for galaxies with a full width at half maximum of 000 . 3 in a 100 . 3 diameter aperture over the Wide Survey, and mAB ≥ 26.4 for a Deep Survey that will cover more than 50 deg2. The paper also describes how the instrument works with the Euclid telescope and survey, and with the science data processing, to extract the cosmological information.

Euclid

Astronomy & Astrophysics EDP Sciences 697 (2025) ARTN A3

Authors:

K Jahnke, W Gillard, M Schirmer, A Ealet, T Maciaszek, E Prieto, R Barbier, C Bonoli, L Corcione, S Dusini, F Grupp, F Hormuth, S Ligori, L Martin, G Morgante, C Padilla, R Toledo-Moreo, M Trifoglio, L Valenziano, R Bender, Fj Castander, B Garilli, Pb Lilje, H-W Rix, Mi Andersen, N Auricchio, A Balestra, J-C Barriere, P Battaglia, M Berthe, C Bodendorf, T Boenke, W Bon, A Bonnefoi, A Caillat, V Capobianco, M Carle, R Casas, H Cho, A Costille, F Ducret, S Ferriol, E Franceschi, J-L Gimenez, W Holmes, A Hornstrup, M Jhabvala, R Kohley, B Kubik, R Laureijs

Abstract:

The Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer (NISP) on board the Euclid satellite provides multiband photometry and R â ³ 450 slitless grism spectroscopy in the 950- 2020 nm wavelength range. In this reference article, we illuminate the background of NISP' s functional and calibration requirements, describe the instrument' s integral components, and provide all its key properties. We also sketch the processes needed to understand how NISP operates and is calibrated as well as its technical potentials and limitations. Links to articles providing more details and the technical background are included. The NISP' s 16 HAWAII-2RG (H2RG) detectors with a plate scale of 03.3 pixel-1 deliver a field of view of 0.57 deg2. In photometric mode, NISP reaches a limiting magnitude of ~24.5 AB mag in three photometric exposures of about 100 s in exposure time for point sources and with a S/N of five. For spectroscopy, NISP' s pointsource sensitivity is a signal-to-noise ratio = 3.5 detection of an emission line with flux 2 10-16 erg s-1 cm-2 integrated over two resolution elements of 13.4 in 3-560 s grism exposures at 1.6 μm (redshifted Hα). Our calibration includes on-ground and in-flight characterisation and monitoring of the pixel-based detector baseline, dark current, non-linearity, and sensitivity to guarantee a relative photometric accuracy better than 1.5% and a relative spectrophotometry better than 0.7%. The wavelength calibration must be accurate to 5 or better. The NISP is the state-of-the-art instrument in the near-infrared for all science beyond small areas available from HST and JWST - and it represents an enormous advance from any existing instrumentation due to its combination of field size and high throughput of telescope and instrument. During Euclid' s six-year survey covering 14 000 deg2 of extragalactic sky, NISP will be the backbone in determining distances of more than a billion galaxies. Its near-infrared data will become a rich reference imaging and spectroscopy data set for the coming decades.

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