We present a very large high-resolution cosmological N-body simulation, the Millennium-XXL or MXXL, which uses 303 billion particles to represent the formation of dark matter structures throughout a ...4.1 Gpc box in a Λ cold dark matter cosmology. We create sky maps and identify large samples of galaxy clusters using surrogates for four different observables: richness estimated from galaxy surveys, X-ray luminosity, integrated Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) signal and lensing mass. The unprecedented combination of volume and resolution allows us to explore in detail how these observables scale with each other and with cluster mass. The scatter correlates between different mass-observable relations because of common sensitivities to the internal structure, orientation and environment of clusters, as well as to line-of-sight superposition of uncorrelated structure. We show that this can account for the apparent discrepancies uncovered recently between the mean thermal SZ signals measured for optically and X-ray selected clusters by stacking data from the Planck satellite. Related systematics can also affect inferences from extreme clusters detected at high redshift. Our results illustrate that cosmological conclusions from galaxy cluster surveys depend critically on proper modelling, not only of the relevant physics, but also of the full distribution of the observables and of the selection biases induced by cluster identification procedures.
ABSTRACT
We develop an extension of subhalo abundance matching (SHAM) capable of accurately reproducing the real and redshift-space clustering of galaxies in a state-of-the-art hydrodynamical ...simulation. Our method uses a low-resolution gravity-only simulation and it includes orphan and tidal disruption prescriptions for satellite galaxies, and a flexible amount of galaxy assembly bias. Furthermore, it includes recipes for star formation rate (SFR) based on the dark matter accretion rate. We test the accuracy of our model against catalogues of stellar-mass- and SFR-selected galaxies in the TNG300 hydrodynamic simulation. By fitting a small number of free parameters, our extended SHAM reproduces the projected correlation function and redshift-space multipoles for number densities $10^{-3} - 10^{-2}\, h^{3}{\rm Mpc}^{-3}$, at z = 1 and z = 0, and for scales r ∈ 0.3 − 20h−1Mpc. Simultaneously, the SHAM results also retrieve the correct halo occupation distribution, the level of galaxy assembly bias, and higher order statistics present in the TNG300 galaxy catalogues. As an application, we show that our model simultaneously fits the projected correlation function of the SDSS in three disjoint stellar mass bins, with an accuracy similar to that of TNG300 galaxies. This SHAM extension can be used to get accurate clustering prediction even when using low and moderate-resolution simulations.
A flexible modelling of galaxy assembly bias Contreras, S; Angulo, R E; Zennaro, M
Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society,
07/2021, Volume:
504, Issue:
4
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
ABSTRACT
We use the illustris TNG300 magneto-hydrodynamic simulation, the sage semi-analytical model, and the subhalo abundance matching technique (SHAM) to examine the diversity in predictions for ...galaxy assembly bias (i.e. the difference in the large-scale clustering of galaxies at a fixed halo mass due to correlations with the assembly history and other properties of host haloes). We consider samples of galaxies selected according to their stellar mass or star formation rate at various redshifts. We find that all models predict an assembly bias signal of different magnitude, redshift evolution, and dependence with selection criteria and number density. To model these non-trivial dependences, we propose an extension to the standard SHAM technique so it can include arbitrary amounts of assembly bias. We do this by preferentially selecting subhaloes with the same internal property but different individual large-scale bias. We find that with this model, we can successfully reproduce the galaxy assembly bias signal in either sage or the tng, for all redshifts and galaxy number densities. We anticipate that this model can be used to constrain the level of assembly bias in observations and aid in the creation of more realistic mock galaxy catalogues.
ABSTRACT
Predicting the spatial distribution of objects as a function of cosmology is an essential ingredient for the exploitation of future galaxy surveys. In this paper, we show that a specially ...designed suite of gravity-only simulations together with cosmology-rescaling algorithms can provide the clustering of dark matter, haloes, and subhaloes with high precision. Specifically, with only three N-body simulations, we obtain the power spectrum of dark matter at z = 0 and 1 to better than 3 per cent precision for essentially all currently viable values of eight cosmological parameters, including massive neutrinos and dynamical dark energy, and over the whole range of scales explored, 0.03 < $k/{h}^{-1}\, {\rm Mpc}^{-1}$ < 5. This precision holds at the same level for mass-selected haloes and for subhaloes selected according to their peak maximum circular velocity. As an initial application of these predictions, we successfully constrain Ωm, σ8, and the scatter in subhalo-abundance-matching employing the projected correlation function of mock SDSS galaxies.
We demonstrate that the output of a cosmological N-body simulation can, to remarkable accuracy, be scaled to represent the growth of large-scale structure in a cosmology with parameters similar to ...but different from those originally assumed. Our algorithm involves three steps: a reassignment of length, mass and velocity units; a relabelling of the time axis and a rescaling of the amplitudes of individual large-scale fluctuation modes. We test it using two matched pairs of simulations. Within each pair, one simulation assumes parameters consistent with analyses of the first-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data. The other has lower matter and baryon densities and a 15 per cent lower fluctuation amplitude, consistent with analyses of the three-year WMAP data. The pairs differ by a factor of a thousand in mass resolution, enabling performance tests on both linear and non-linear scales. Our scaling reproduces the mass power spectra of the target cosmology to better than 0.5 per cent on large scales (k < 0.1 h Mpc−1) both in real and in redshift space. In particular, the baryonic acoustic oscillation features of the original cosmology are removed and are correctly replaced by those of the target cosmology. Errors are still below 3 per cent for k < 1 h Mpc−1. Power spectra of the dark halo distribution are even more precisely reproduced, with errors below 1 per cent on all scales tested. A halo-by-halo comparison shows that centre-of-mass positions and velocities are reproduced to better than 90 h−1 kpc and 5 per cent, respectively. Halo masses, concentrations and spins are also reproduced at about the 10 per cent level, although with small biases. Halo assembly histories are accurately reproduced, leading to central galaxy magnitudes with errors of about 0.25 mag and a bias of about 0.13 mag for a representative semi-analytic model. This algorithm will enable a systematic exploration of the coupling between cosmological parameter estimates and uncertainties in galaxy formation in future large-scale structure surveys.
The cosmological parameters preferred by the cosmic microwave background (CMB) primary anisotropies predict many more galaxy clusters than those that have been detected via the thermal ...Sunyaev–Zeldovich (tSZ) effect. This discrepancy has attracted considerable attention since it might be evidence of physics beyond the simplest ΛCDM model. However, an accurate and robust calibration of the mass-observable relation for clusters is necessary for the comparison, which has been proven difficult to obtain so far. Here, we present new constraints on the mass–pressure relation by combining tSZ and CMB lensing measurements of optically selected clusters. Consequently, our galaxy cluster sample is independent of the data employed to derive cosmological constrains. We estimate an average hydrostatic mass bias of b = 0.26 ± 0.07, with no significant mass or redshift evolution. This value greatly reduces the discrepancy between the predictions of ΛCDM and the observed abundance of tSZ clusters but agrees with recent estimates from tSZ clustering. On the other hand, our value for b is higher than the predictions from hydrodynamical simulations. This suggests mechanisms that drive large departures from hydrostatic equilibrium and that are not included in the latest simulations, and/or unaccounted systematic errors such as biases in the cluster catalogue that are due to the optical selection.
Full text
Available for:
FMFMET, NUK, UL, UM, UPUK
ABSTRACT
One of the main predictions of excursion set theory is that the clustering of dark matter haloes only depends on halo mass. However, it has been long established that the clustering of ...haloes also depends on other properties, including formation time, concentration, and spin; this effect is commonly known as halo assembly bias (HAB). We use a suite of gravity-only simulations to study the dependence of HAB on cosmology; these simulations cover cosmological parameters spanning 10σ around state-of-the-art best-fitting values, including standard extensions of the ΛCDM paradigm such as neutrino mass and dynamical dark energy. We find that, when studying the peak height-bias relation, the strength of HAB presents variations smaller than 0.05 dex across all cosmologies studied for concentration- and spin-selected haloes, letting us conclude that the dependence of HAB upon cosmology is negligible. We then study the dependence of galaxy assembly bias (i.e. the manifestation of HAB in galaxy clustering) on cosmology using subhalo abundance matching. We find that galaxy assembly bias also presents very small dependence upon cosmology (∼ 2 per cent–4 per cent of the total clustering); on the other hand, we find that the dependence of this signal on the galaxy formation parameters of our galaxy model is much stronger. Taken together, these results let us conclude that the dependence of halo and galaxy assembly bias on cosmology is practically negligible.
We assess the detectability of baryonic acoustic oscillation (BAO) in the power spectrum of galaxies using ultralarge volume N-body simulations of the hierarchical clustering of dark matter and ...semi-analytical modelling of galaxy formation. A step-by-step illustration is given of the various effects (non-linear fluctuation growth, peculiar motions, non-linear and scale-dependent bias) which systematically change the form of the galaxy power spectrum on large scales from the simple prediction of linear perturbation theory. Using a new method to extract the scale of the oscillations, we nevertheless find that the BAO approach gives an unbiased estimate of the sound horizon scale. Sampling variance remains the dominant source of error despite the huge volume of our simulation box (=2.41 h−3Gpc3). We use our results to forecast the accuracy with which forthcoming surveys will be able to measure the sound horizon scale, s, and, hence constrain the dark energy equation of state parameter, w (with simplifying assumptions and without marginalizing over the other cosmological parameters). Pan-STARRS could potentially yield a measurement with an accuracy of Δs/s= 0.5–0.7 per cent (corresponding to Δw≈ 2–3 per cent), which is competitive with the proposed WFMOS survey (Δs/s= 1 per cent Δw≈ 4 per cent). Achieving Δw≤ 1 per cent using BAO alone is beyond any currently commissioned project and will require an all-sky spectroscopic survey, such as would be undertaken by the SPACE mission concept under proposal to ESA.
We use the Millennium Simulation, a large, high-resolution N-body simulation of the evolution of structure in a Λ cold dark matter cosmology, to study the properties and fate of substructures within ...a large sample of dark matter haloes. We find that the subhalo mass function departs significantly from a power law at the high-mass end. We also find that the radial and angular distributions of substructures depend on subhalo mass. In particular, high-mass subhaloes tend to be less radially concentrated and to have angular distributions closer to the direction perpendicular to the spin of the host halo than their less massive counterparts. We find that mergers between subhaloes occur. These tend to be between substructures that were already dynamically associated before accretion into the main halo. For subhaloes larger than 0.001 times the mass of the host halo, it is more likely that the subhalo will merge with the central or main subhalo than with another subhalo larger than itself. For lower masses, subhalo–subhalo mergers become equally likely to mergers with the main subhalo. Our results have implications for the variation of galaxy properties with environment and for the treatment of mergers in galaxy formation models.
We use an extremely large volume (2.4 h−3Gpc3), high-resolution N-body simulation to measure the higher order clustering of dark matter haloes as a function of mass and internal structure. As a ...result of the large simulation volume and the use of a novel ‘cross-moment’ counts-in-cells technique which suppresses discreteness noise, we are able to measure the clustering of haloes corresponding to rarer peaks than was possible in previous studies; the rarest haloes for which we measure the variance are 100 times more clustered than the dark matter. We are able to extract, for the first time, halo bias parameters from linear up to fourth order. For all orders measured, we find that the bias parameters are a strong function of mass for haloes more massive than the characteristic mass M*. Currently, no theoretical model is able to reproduce this mass dependence closely. We find that the bias parameters also depend on the internal structure of the halo up to fourth order. For haloes more massive than M*, we find that the more concentrated haloes are more weakly clustered than the less concentrated ones. We see no dependence of clustering on concentration for haloes with masses M < M*; this is contrary to the trend reported in the literature when segregating haloes by their formation time. Our results are insensitive to whether haloes are labelled by the total mass returned by the friends-of-friends group finder or by the mass of the most massive substructure. This implies that our conclusions are not an artefact of the particular choice of group finding algorithm. Our results will provide important input to theoretical models of galaxy clustering.