Validating Synthetic Galaxy Catalogs for Dark Energy Science in the LSST Era

Journal Article · 16 January 2022 · The Open Journal of Astrophysics

DOI: https://doi.org/10.21105/astro.2110.03769 · OSTI ID:1831897

Kovacs, Eve; Mao, Yao-Yuan; Aguena, Michel; Bahmanyar, Anita; Broussard, Adam; Butler, James; Campbell, Duncan; Chang, Chihway; Fu, Shenming; Heitmann, Katrin; Korytov, Danila; Lanusse, François; Larsen, Patricia; Mandelbaum, Rachel; Morrison, Christopher B.; Payerne, Constantin; Ricci, Marina; Rykoff, Eli; Sánchez, F. Javier; Sevilla-Noarbe, Ignacio ; Simet, Melanie; To, Chun-Hao; Vikraman, Vinu; Zhou, Rongpu; Avestruz, Camille; Benoist, Christophe; Benson, Andrew J.; Bleem, Lindsey; Ćiprianović, Aleksandra; Combet, Céline; Gawiser, Eric; He, Shiyuan; Joseph, Remy; Newman, Jeffrey A.; Prat, Judit; Schmidt, Samuel; Slosar, Anže; Zuntz, Joe

Large simulation efforts are required to provide synthetic galaxy catalogs for ongoing and upcoming cosmology surveys. These extragalactic catalogs are being used for many diverse purposes covering a wide range of scientific topics. In order to be useful, they must offer realistically complex information about the galaxies they contain. Hence, it is critical to implement a rigorous validation procedure that ensures that the simulated galaxy properties faithfully capture observations and delivers an assessment of the level of realism attained by the catalog. We present here a suite of validation tests that have been developed by the Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Dark Energy Science Collaboration (DESC). We discuss how the inclusion of each test is driven by the scientific targets for static ground-based dark energy science and by the availability of suitable validation data. The validation criteria that are used to assess the performance of a catalog are flexible and depend on the science goals. We illustrate the utility of this suite by showing examples for the validation of cosmoDC2, the extragalactic catalog recently released for the LSST DESC second Data Challenge.

• Research Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States); Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States); SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP)
• Contributing Organization: The LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration
• Grant/Contract Number: AC02-07CH11359
• OSTI ID: 1831897
• Alternate ID(s): OSTI ID: 2403074; OSTI ID: 1906903; OSTI ID: 1984469
• Report Number(s): FERMILAB-PUB--21-524-SCD; arXiv:2110.03769; {"Journal ID: ISSN 2565-6120",oai:inspirehep.net:1940598}
• Journal Information: The Open Journal of Astrophysics, Journal Name: The Open Journal of Astrophysics Vol. 5; ISSN 2565-6120
• Publisher: Maynooth Academic PublishingCopyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English