Abstract
Galaxy clusters provide a unique probe of the late-time cosmic structure and serve as a powerful independent test of the ΛCDM model. This work presents the first set of cosmological constraints derived with ∼16; 000 optically selected redMaPPer clusters across nearly 5000 deg2 using DES year 3 datasets. Our analysis leverages a consistent modeling framework for galaxy cluster cosmology and DES-Y3 joint analyses of galaxy clustering and weak lensing (3 × 2pt), ensuring direct comparability with the DES-Y3 3 × 2pt analysis.We obtain constraints of $$ and $$ from the cluster-based data vector. We find that cluster constraints and 3 × 2pt constraints are consistent under the ΛCDM model with a posterior predictive distribution (PPD) value of 0.53. The consistency between clusters and 3 × 2pt provides a stringent test of ΛCDM across different mass and spatial scales. Jointly analyzing clusters with 3 × 2pt further improves cosmological constraints, yielding $$ and $$, a 24% improvement in the Ωm − S8 figure of merit over 3 × 2pt alone. Moreover, we find no significant deviation from the Planck CMB constraints with a probability to exceed (PTE) value of 0.6, significantly reducing previous S8 tension claims. Finally, combining DES 3 × 2pt, DES clusters, and PlanckCMBplaces an upper limit on the sum of neutrino masses of Pmν < 0.26 eV at 95% confidence under the ΛCDM model. These results establish optically selected clusters as a key cosmological probe and pave the way for cluster-based analyses in upcoming stage-IV surveys such as LSST, Euclid, and Roman.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Physical Review D |
| Volume | 112 |
| Issue number | 8 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Oct 17 2025 |
Funding
Funding for the DES Projects has been provided by the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Ministry of Science and Education of Spain, the Science and Technology Facilities Council of the United Kingdom, the Higher Education Funding Council for England, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the Kavli Institute of Cosmological Physics at the University of Chicago, the Center for Cosmology and Astro-Particle Physics at the Ohio State University, the Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy at Texas A&M University, Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos, Fundação Carlos Chagas Filho de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico and the Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and the Collaborating Institutions in the Dark Energy Survey. The collaborating institutions are Argonne National Laboratory, the University of California at Santa Cruz, the University of Cambridge, Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas-Madrid, the University of Chicago, University College London, the DES-Brazil Consortium, the University of Edinburgh, the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the Institut de Ciències de l’Espai (IEEC/CSIC), the Institut de Física d’Altes Energies, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Ludwig-Maximilians Universität München and the associated Excellence Cluster Universe, the University of Michigan, NSF NOIRLab, the University of Nottingham, The Ohio State University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Portsmouth, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, the University of Sussex, Texas A&M University, and the OzDES Membership Consortium. Based in part on observations at NSF Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory at NSF NOIRLab (NOIRLab Prop. ID 2012B-0001; PI: J. Frieman), which is managed by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) under a cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation. The DES data management system is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grants No. AST-1138766 and No. AST-1536171. The DES participants from Spanish institutions are partially supported by MICINN under Grants No. PID2021-123012, No. PID2021-128989, No. PID2022-141079, No. SEV-2016-0588, No. CEX2020-001058-M and No. CEX2020-001007-S, some of which include ERDF funds from the European Union. IFAE is partially funded by the CERCA program of the Generalitat de Catalunya. We acknowledge support from the Brazilian Instituto Nacional de Ciência e Tecnologia (INCT) do e-Universo (CNPq Grant No. 465376/2014-2). This document was prepared by the DES Collaboration using the resources of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), a U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of High Energy Physics HEP User Facility. Fermilab is managed by Fermi Forward Discovery Group, LLC, acting under Contract No. 89243024CSC000002. We would like to thank Stanford University, the Stanford Research Computing Center, the Ohio Supercomputer Center, and the University of Chicago’s Research Computing Center for providing the computational resources and support that contributed to these research results.