Velocity reconstruction for the kinematic Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect in the era of the new generation of galaxy surveys


Thursday, 29 August 2024 noon — 1 p.m. MST

Your time: Thursday, 29 August 2024 7:00 pm - 8:00 pm (UTC +00:00)

AURA Lecture Hall

NOIRLab South Colloquia
Bernardita Ried (Stanford)

Peculiar velocities of galaxies and halos can be reconstructed from their spatial distribution alone. This technique is analogous to the baryon acoustic oscillations reconstruction, using the continuity equation to connect density and velocity fields. The resulting reconstructed velocities can be used to measure imprints of galaxy velocities on the cosmic microwave background like the kinematic Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect or the moving lens effect. As the precision of these measurements increases, characterizing the performance of the velocity reconstruction becomes crucial to allow unbiased and statistically optimal inference. In this talk I will present my latest results on studying this effect on simulations, where we quantify the impact of redshift-space distortions, photometric redshift errors, satellite galaxy fraction, and more!