Title: DESI-253.2534+26.8843: A New Einstein Cross Spectroscopically Confirmed with Very Large Telescope/MUSE and Modeled with GIGA-Lens

Abstract

Gravitational lensing provides unique insights into astrophysics and cosmology, including the determination of galaxy mass profiles and constraining cosmological parameters. We present spectroscopic confirmation and lens modeling of the strong lensing system DESI-253.2534+26.8843, discovered in the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Legacy Imaging Surveys data. This system consists of a massive elliptical galaxy surrounded by four blue images forming an Einstein Cross pattern. We obtained spectroscopic observations of this system using the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer on ESO's Very Large Telescope and confirmed its lensing nature. The main lens, which is the elliptical galaxy, has a redshift of z_L1 = 0.636 ± 0.001, while the spectra of the background source images are typical of a starburst galaxy and have a redshift of z_s = 2.597 ± 0.001. Additionally, we identified a faint galaxy foreground of one of the lensed images, with a redshift of z_L2 = 0.386. We employed the GIGA-Lens modeling code to characterize this system and determined the Einstein radius of the main lens to be $${\theta }_{{\rm{E}}}=2\buildrel{\prime\prime}\over{.} {520}_{-0.031}^{+0.032}$$, which corresponds to a velocity dispersion of σ = 379 ± 2 km s^–1. Our study contributes to a growing catalog of this rare kind of strong lensing system and demonstrates the effectiveness of spectroscopic integral field unit observations and advanced modeling techniques in understanding the properties of these systems.

Authors:

Cikota, Aleksandar  ^[1];

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• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0001-7101-9831"

Bertolla, Ivonne Toro  ^[1];

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Huang, Xiaosheng  ^[2];

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Baltasar, Saul  ^[3];

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Ratier-Werbin, Nicolas  ^[3];

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Sheu, William  ^[4];

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Storfer, Christopher  ^[5];

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Suzuki, Nao  ^[6];

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Schlegel, David J.  ^[3];

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Cartier, Regis  ^[1];

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Torres, Simon  ^[7];

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Cikota, Stefan  ^[8];

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Jullo, Eric  ^[9]

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• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0002-9253-053X"

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. NSF’s NOIRLab (Chile). Gemini Observatory
2. University of San Francisco (California); Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
3. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
4. Univ. of California, Los Angeles, CA (United States)
5. Univ. of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI (United States)
6. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of Tokyo (Japan). Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (WPI)
7. NSF’s NOIRLab (Chile). SOAR Telescope
8. Calar Alto Observatory (Spain)
9. Aix-Marseille Univ., Marseille (France); Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) (France)

Publication Date:

Tue Aug 08 00:00:00 EDT 2023

Research Org.:

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES). Scientific User Facilities (SUF)

OSTI Identifier:

2007144

Grant/Contract Number:  

AC02-05CH11231

Resource Type:

Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:

The Astrophysical Journal. Letters

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Volume: 953; Journal Issue: 1; Journal ID: ISSN 2041-8205

Publisher:

IOP Publishing

Country of Publication:

United States

Language:

English

Subject:

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS; strong gravitational lensing