RCSLenS: testing gravitational physics through the cross-correlation of weak lensing and large-scale structure

Chris Blake, Shahab Joudaki, Catherine Heymans, Ami Choi, Thomas Erben, Joachim Harnois-Deraps, Hendrik Hildebrandt, Benjamin Joachimi, Reiko Nakajima, Ludovic van Waerbeke, Massimo Viola

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract / Description of output

The unknown nature of `dark energy' motivates continued cosmological tests of large-scale gravitational physics. We present a new consistency check based on the relative amplitude of non-relativistic galaxy peculiar motions, measured via redshift-space distortion, and the relativistic deflection of light by those same galaxies traced by galaxy-galaxy lensing. We take advantage of the latest generation of deep, overlapping imaging and spectroscopic data sets, combining the Red Cluster Sequence Lensing Survey, the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Lensing Survey, the WiggleZ Dark Energy Survey and the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey. We quantify the results using the `gravitational slip' statistic EG, which we estimate as 0.48 ± 0.10 at z = 0.32 and 0.30 ± 0.07 at z = 0.57, the latter constituting the highest redshift at which this quantity has been determined. These measurements are consistent with the predictions of General Relativity, for a perturbed Friedmann-Robertson-Walker metric in a Universe dominated by a cosmological constant, which are EG = 0.41 and 0.36 at these respective redshifts. The combination of redshift-space distortion and gravitational lensing data from current and future galaxy surveys will offer increasingly stringent tests of fundamental cosmology.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2806-2828
JournalMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Volume456
Issue number3
Early online date31 Dec 2015
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Mar 2016

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • surveys
  • dark energy
  • large-scale structure of Universe

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