The surprising accuracy of isothermal Jeans modelling of self-interacting dark matter density profiles (2020)
Journal Article
Robertson, A., Massey, R., Eke, V., Schaye, J., & Theuns, T. (2021). The surprising accuracy of isothermal Jeans modelling of self-interacting dark matter density profiles. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 501(3), 4610-5634. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa3954

Recent claims of observational evidence for self-interacting dark matter (SIDM) have relied on a semi-analytic method for predicting the density profiles of galaxies and galaxy clusters containing SIDM. We present a thorough description of this metho... Read More about The surprising accuracy of isothermal Jeans modelling of self-interacting dark matter density profiles.

The effect of pre-impact spin on the Moon-forming collision (2020)
Journal Article
Ruiz-Bonilla, S., Eke, V., Kegerreis, J., Massey, R., & Teodoro, L. (2021). The effect of pre-impact spin on the Moon-forming collision. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 500(3), 2861-2870. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa3385

We simulate the hypothesized collision between the proto-Earth and a Mars-sized impactor that created the Moon. Among the resulting debris disc in some impacts, we find a self-gravitating clump of material. It is roughly the mass of the Moon, contain... Read More about The effect of pre-impact spin on the Moon-forming collision.

Euclid: Forecast constraints on the cosmic distance duality relation with complementary external probes (2020)
Journal Article
Martinelli, M., Martins, C., Nesseris, S., Sapone, D., Tutusaus, I., Avgoustidis, A., …Zacchei, A. (2020). Euclid: Forecast constraints on the cosmic distance duality relation with complementary external probes. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 644, Article A80. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202039078

Context. In metric theories of gravity with photon number conservation, the luminosity and angular diameter distances are related via the Etherington relation, also known as the distance duality relation (DDR). A violation of this relation would rule... Read More about Euclid: Forecast constraints on the cosmic distance duality relation with complementary external probes.

Euclid: Identification of asteroid streaks in simulated images using StreakDet software (2020)
Journal Article
Pöntinen, M., Granvik, M., Nucita, A., Conversi, L., Altieri, B., Auricchio, N., …Zoubian, J. (2020). Euclid: Identification of asteroid streaks in simulated images using StreakDet software. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 644, Article A35. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202037765

Context. The ESA Euclid space telescope could observe up to 150 000 asteroids as a side product of its primary cosmological mission. Asteroids appear as trailed sources, that is streaks, in the images. Owing to the survey area of 15 000 square degree... Read More about Euclid: Identification of asteroid streaks in simulated images using StreakDet software.

Optical Night Sky Brightness Measurements from the Stratosphere (2020)
Journal Article
Gill, A., Benton, S. J., Brown, A. M., Clark, P., Damaren, C. J., Eifler, T., …Tam, S. (2020). Optical Night Sky Brightness Measurements from the Stratosphere. Astronomical Journal, 160(6), Article 266. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/abbffb

This paper presents optical night sky brightness measurements from the stratosphere using CCD images taken with the Super-pressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT). The data used for estimating the backgrounds were obtained during three com... Read More about Optical Night Sky Brightness Measurements from the Stratosphere.

Euclid: The importance of galaxy clustering and weak lensing cross-correlations within the photometric Euclid survey (2020)
Journal Article
Tutusaus, I., Martinelli, M., Cardone, V., Camera, S., Yahia-Cherif, S., Casas, S., …Zoubian, J. (2020). Euclid: The importance of galaxy clustering and weak lensing cross-correlations within the photometric Euclid survey. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 643, Article A70. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202038313

Context. The data from the Euclid mission will enable the measurement of the angular positions and weak lensing shapes of over a billion galaxies, with their photometric redshifts obtained together with ground-based observations. This large dataset,... Read More about Euclid: The importance of galaxy clustering and weak lensing cross-correlations within the photometric Euclid survey.

Euclid preparation: VIII. The Complete Calibration of the Colour–Redshift Relation survey: VLT/KMOS observations and data release (2020)
Journal Article
Guglielmo, V., Saglia, R., Castander, F., Galametz, A., Paltani, S., Bender, R., …Zucca, E. (2020). Euclid preparation: VIII. The Complete Calibration of the Colour–Redshift Relation survey: VLT/KMOS observations and data release. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 642, Article A192. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202038334

The Complete Calibration of the Colour–Redshift Relation survey (C3R2) is a spectroscopic effort involving ESO and Keck facilities designed specifically to empirically calibrate the galaxy colour–redshift relation – P(z|C) to the Euclid depth (iAB =... Read More about Euclid preparation: VIII. The Complete Calibration of the Colour–Redshift Relation survey: VLT/KMOS observations and data release.

Euclid preparation: VII. Forecast validation for Euclid cosmological probes (2020)
Journal Article
Blanchard, A., Camera, S., Carbone, C., Cardone, V., Casas, S., Clesse, S., …Zucca, E. (2020). Euclid preparation: VII. Forecast validation for Euclid cosmological probes. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 642, Article A191. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202038071

Aims. The Euclid space telescope will measure the shapes and redshifts of galaxies to reconstruct the expansion history of the Universe and the growth of cosmic structures. The estimation of the expected performance of the experiment, in terms of pre... Read More about Euclid preparation: VII. Forecast validation for Euclid cosmological probes.

Reconciling galaxy cluster shapes, measured by theorists vs observers (2020)
Journal Article
Harvey, D., Robertson, A., Tam, S., Jauzac, M., Massey, R., Rhodes, J., & McCarthy, I. G. (2021). Reconciling galaxy cluster shapes, measured by theorists vs observers. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 500(2), 2627-2644. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa3193

If properly calibrated, the shapes of galaxy clusters can be used to investigate many physical processes: from feedback and quenching of star formation, to the nature of dark matter. Theorists frequently measure shapes using moments of inertia of sim... Read More about Reconciling galaxy cluster shapes, measured by theorists vs observers.

Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets: A Scaling Law for any Speed, Angle, Mass, and Density (2020)
Journal Article
Kegerreis, J., Eke, V., Catling, D., Massey, R., Teodoro, L., & Zahnle, K. (2020). Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets: A Scaling Law for any Speed, Angle, Mass, and Density. Astrophysical Journal Letters, 901(2), Article L31. https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/abb5fb

We present a new scaling law to predict the loss of atmosphere from planetary collisions for any speed, angle, impactor mass, target mass, and body composition, in the regime of giant impacts onto broadly terrestrial planets with relatively thin atmo... Read More about Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets: A Scaling Law for any Speed, Angle, Mass, and Density.

Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets (2020)
Journal Article
Kegerreis, J., Eke, V., Massey, R., & Teodoro, L. (2020). Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets. Astrophysical Journal, 897(2), Article 161. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab9810

We examine the mechanisms by which the atmosphere can be eroded by giant impacts onto Earth-like planets with thin atmospheres, using 3D smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations with sufficient resolution to directly model the fate of low-mass atm... Read More about Atmospheric Erosion by Giant Impacts onto Terrestrial Planets.

Euclid: Reconstruction of weak-lensing mass maps for non-Gaussianity studies (2020)
Journal Article
Pires, S., Vandenbussche, V., Kansal, V., Bender, R., Blot, L., Bonino, D., …Wang, Y. (2020). Euclid: Reconstruction of weak-lensing mass maps for non-Gaussianity studies. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 638, Article A141. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201936865

Weak lensing, which is the deflection of light by matter along the line of sight, has proven to be an efficient method for constraining models of structure formation and reveal the nature of dark energy. So far, most weak-lensing studies have focused... Read More about Euclid: Reconstruction of weak-lensing mass maps for non-Gaussianity studies.

The distribution of dark matter and gas spanning 6 Mpc around the post-merger galaxy cluster MS 0451-03 (2020)
Journal Article
Tam, S., Jauzac, M., Massey, R., Harvey, D., Eckert, D., Ebeling, H., …Smith, G. (2020). The distribution of dark matter and gas spanning 6 Mpc around the post-merger galaxy cluster MS 0451-03. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 496(3), 4032-4050. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa1828

Using the largest mosaic of Hubble Space Telescope images around a galaxy cluster, we map the distribution of dark matter throughout an ∼6 × 6 Mpc2 area centred on the cluster MS 0451−03 (z = 0.54, M200=1.65×1015M⊙⁠). Our joint strong- and weak-lensi... Read More about The distribution of dark matter and gas spanning 6 Mpc around the post-merger galaxy cluster MS 0451-03.

Validation of PSF Models for HST and Other Space-Based Observations (2020)
Journal Article
Gillis, B. R., Schrabback, T., Marggraf, O., Mandelbaum, R., Massey, R., Rhodes, J., & Taylor, A. (2020). Validation of PSF Models for HST and Other Space-Based Observations. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 496(4), 5017-5038. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa1818

Forthcoming space-based observations will require high-quality point-spread function (PSF) models for weak gravitational lensing measurements. One approach to generating these models is using a wavefront model based on the known telescope optics. We... Read More about Validation of PSF Models for HST and Other Space-Based Observations.

Mapping dark matter and finding filaments: calibration of lensing analysis techniques on simulated data (2020)
Journal Article
Tam, S., Massey, R., Jauzac, M., & Robertson, A. (2020). Mapping dark matter and finding filaments: calibration of lensing analysis techniques on simulated data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 496(3), 3973-3990. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa1756

We quantify the performance of mass mapping techniques on mock imaging and gravitational lensing data of galaxy clusters. The optimum method depends upon the scientific goal. We assess measurements of clusters’ radial density profiles, departures fro... Read More about Mapping dark matter and finding filaments: calibration of lensing analysis techniques on simulated data.

Download by parachute: retrieval of assets from high altitude balloons (2020)
Journal Article
Sirks, E., Clark, P., Massey, R., Benton, S., Brown, A., Damaren, C., …Tam, S. (2020). Download by parachute: retrieval of assets from high altitude balloons. Journal of Instrumentation, 15(05), Article P05014. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/15/05/p05014

We present a publicly-available toolkit of flight-proven hardware and software to retrieve 5 TB of data or small physical samples from a stratospheric balloon platform. Before launch, a capsule is attached to the balloon, and rises with it. Upon remo... Read More about Download by parachute: retrieval of assets from high altitude balloons.

On building a cluster watch-list for identifying strongly lensed supernovae, gravitational waves and kilonovae (2020)
Journal Article
Ryczanowski, D., Smith, G. P., Bianconi, M., Massey, R., Robertson, A., & Jauzac, M. (2020). On building a cluster watch-list for identifying strongly lensed supernovae, gravitational waves and kilonovae. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 495(2), 1666-1671. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa1274

Motivated by discovering strongly-lensed supernovae, gravitational waves, and kilonovae in the 2020s, we investigate whether to build a watch-list of clusters based on observed cluster properties (i.e. lens-plane selection) or on the detectability of... Read More about On building a cluster watch-list for identifying strongly lensed supernovae, gravitational waves and kilonovae.

Euclid: The reduced shear approximation and magnification bias for Stage IV cosmic shear experiments (2020)
Journal Article
Deshpande, A., Kitching, T., Cardone, V., Taylor, P., Casas, S., Camera, S., …Zoubian, J. (2020). Euclid: The reduced shear approximation and magnification bias for Stage IV cosmic shear experiments. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 636, Article A95. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201937323

Context. Stage IV weak lensing experiments will offer more than an order of magnitude leap in precision. We must therefore ensure that our analyses remain accurate in this new era. Accordingly, previously ignored systematic effects must be addressed.... Read More about Euclid: The reduced shear approximation and magnification bias for Stage IV cosmic shear experiments.

Understanding the large inferred Einstein radii of observed low-mass galaxy clusters (2020)
Journal Article
Robertson, A., Massey, R., & Eke, V. (2020). Understanding the large inferred Einstein radii of observed low-mass galaxy clusters. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(4), 4706-4712. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa1076

We assess a claim that observed galaxy clusters with mass ∼1014M⊙ are more centrally concentrated than predicted in lambda cold dark matter (ΛCDM). We generate mock strong gravitational lensing observations, taking the lenses from a cosmological hydr... Read More about Understanding the large inferred Einstein radii of observed low-mass galaxy clusters.

Euclid: Nonparametric point spread function field recovery through interpolation on a graph Laplacian (2020)
Journal Article
Schmitz, M., Starck, J., Ngole Mboula, F., Auricchio, N., Brinchmann, J., Vito Capobianco, R., …Zoubian, J. (2020). Euclid: Nonparametric point spread function field recovery through interpolation on a graph Laplacian. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 636, https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201936094

Context. Future weak lensing surveys, such as the Euclid mission, will attempt to measure the shapes of billions of galaxies in order to derive cosmological information. These surveys will attain very low levels of statistical error, and systematic e... Read More about Euclid: Nonparametric point spread function field recovery through interpolation on a graph Laplacian.