DES Y1 Results: Validating cosmological parameter estimation using simulated Dark Energy Surveys

DES Collaboration

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31 Scopus citations

Abstract

We use mock galaxy survey simulations designed to resemble the Dark Energy Survey Year 1 (DES Y1) data to validate and inform cosmological parameter estimation. When similar analysis tools are applied to both simulations and real survey data, they provide powerful validation tests of the DES Y1 cosmological analyses presented in companion papers. We use two suites of galaxy simulations produced using different methods, which therefore provide independent tests of our cosmological parameter inference. The cosmological analysis we aim to validate is presented in DES Collaboration et al. (2017) and uses angular two-point correlation functions of galaxy number counts and weak lensing shear, as well as their crosscorrelation, in multiple redshift bins. While our constraints depend on the specific set of simulated realisations available, for both suites of simulations we find that the input cosmology is consistent with the combined constraints from multiple simulated DES Y1 realizations in the Ωm - σ8 plane. For one of the suites, we are able to show with high confidence that any biases in the inferred S8 = σ8m/0.3)0.5 and Ωm are smaller than the DES Y1 1-σ uncertainties. For the other suite, for which we have fewer realizations, we are unable to be this conclusive; we infer a roughly 60 per cent (70 per cent) probability that systematic bias in the recovered Ωm (S8) is sub-dominant to the DES Y1 uncertainty. As cosmological analyses of this kind become increasingly more precise, validation of parameter inference using survey simulations will be essential to demonstrate robustness.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)4614-4635
Number of pages22
JournalMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Volume480
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - 2018

Funding

The DES data management system is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Numbers AST-1138766 and AST-1536171. The DES participants from Spanish institutions are partially supported by MINECO under grants AYA2015-71825, ESP2015-66861, FPA2015-68048, SEV-2016-0588, SEV-2016-0597, and MDM-2015-0509, some of which include ERDF funds from the European Union. IFAE is partially funded by the CERCA program of the Generalitat de Catalunya. Research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union\u2019s Seventh Framework Program (FP7/2007-2013) including ERC grant agreements 240672, 291329, and 306478. We acknowledge support from the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAAS-TRO), through project number CE110001020, and the Brazilian In-stituto Nacional de Ci\u00EAncia e Tecnologia (INCT) e-Universe (CNPq grant 465376/2014-2). 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, Fundac\u00B8\u00E3o Carlos Chagas Filho de Amparo \u00E0 Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Conselho Nacional de Desen-volvimento Cient\u00EDfico e Tecnol\u00F3gico and the Minist\u00E9rio da Ci\u00EAncia, Tecnologia e Inovac\u00B8\u00E3o, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and the Collaborating Institutions in the Dark Energy Survey. Thanks to Chris Hirata for useful discussions. Funding for the DES Projects has been provided by the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. National Science Foundation, theMinistry 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, Funda\u00E7\u00E3o Carlos Chagas Filho de Amparo \u00E0 Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cient\u00EDfico e Tecnol\u00F3gico and the Minist\u00E9rio da Ci\u00EAncia, Tecnologia e Inova\u00E7\u00E3o, 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 Energ\u00E9ticas, Medioambientales y Tecnol\u00F3gicas-Madrid, the University of Chicago, University College London, the DES-Brazil Consortium, the University of Edinburgh, the Eidgen\u00F6ssische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Z\u00FCrich, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the Institut de Ci\u00E8ncies de l'Espai (IEEC/CSIC), the Institut de F\u00EDsica d'Altes Energies, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Ludwig-Maximilians Universit \u00E4t M\u00FCnchen and the associated Excellence Cluster Universe, the University of Michigan, the National Optical Astronomy Observatory, 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, TexasA&MUniversity, and the OzDESMembership Consortium. Based in part on observations at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, National Optical Astronomy Observatory, which is operated 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 Grant Numbers AST-1138766 and AST-1536171. The DES participants from Spanish institutions are partially supported by MINECO under grants AYA2015-71825, ESP2015-66861, FPA2015-68048, SEV-2016-0588, SEV-2016-0597, and MDM-2015-0509, some of which include ERDF funds from the European Union. IFAE is partially funded by the CERCA program of the Generalitat de Catalunya. Research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Framework Program (FP7/2007-2013) includingERCgrant agreements 240672, 291329, and 306478.We acknowledge support from the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO), through project number CE110001020, and the Brazilian Instituto Nacional de Ci\u00EAncia e Tecnologia (INCT) e-Universe (CNPq grant 465376/2014-2). This manuscript has been authored by Fermi Research Alliance, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC02-07CH11359 with the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of High Energy Physics. TheUnited StatesGovernment retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. This research used resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported by the Office of Science of theU.S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. Part of the BCC simulations used in this studies were performed using resources provided by the University of Chicago Research Computing Center, which we acknowledge for its support. This manuscript has been authored by Fermi Research Alliance, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC02-07CH11359 with the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of High Energy Physics. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by This research used resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. Part of the BCC simulations used in this studies were performed using resources provided by the University of Chicago Research Computing Center, which we acknowledge for its support.

Keywords

  • Cosmological parameters
  • Large-scale structure of Universe

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