Principal Investigator: Massimo Meneghetti
PI Institution: INAF - Osservatorio di Astrofisica e Scienza dello Spazio
Investigators
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Title: Simulating HST observations of strong lensing clusters
Cycle: 22
Abstract
The Frontier Fields {FF} are using galaxy cluster gravitational lensing to boost the powers of Hubble and Spitzer to reveal the faintest galaxies yet observed. Accurate gravitational lensing models with uncertainty estimates are required to study some of the physical parameters of the lensed galaxies. Simulated HST observations of lensing clusters with known mass distributions are ideal to determine the accuracies of these modeling methods. Our team has begun performing these tests, demonstrating that integrated quantities such as lensed number counts are accurately recovered, enabling luminosity functions to be constrained. We have also begun to quantify magnification uncertainties for individual galaxies, but additional tests are needed. Here we propose to create a set of simulated osbervations of clusters selected to be analogs of the CLASH and FF clusters. They will include lensing effects and they will be delivered to the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes as a legacy product for others to analyze. They will be usable to extend our tests for robustly determine the accuracies in model magnification and mass measurements. Mass uncertainties will be a key ingredient in efforts to use galaxy clusters to constrain cosmology and theories of structure formation. Results from this program will also be useful to improve lens modeling methods toward more optimal use of the large numbers of lensing constraints available in deep FF imaging. This program will help astronomers realize the full potential of the large investments of Hubble, Spitzer, Chandra, and ground-based observing time in the FF, CLASH, and other past and future cluster lensing observations.