Engineering topics

Chen, X. (ORCID:0000000334560957)

Publications and source records attributed to Chen, X. (ORCID:0000000334560957).

10 records

DOE OSTI2026

Combined tracer analysis for DESI 2024 BAO

This paper demonstrates how the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Data Release 1 (DR1) and future baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) analyses can optimally combine overlapping tracers (galaxies of distinct types) in the same redshift range. We make a unified catalog of Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) and Emission Line Galaxies (ELGs) in the redshift range 0.8 < z < 1.1 and investigate the impact on the BAO constraints. DESI DR1 contains ∼ 30% of the final DESI LRG sample and less than 25% of the final ELG sample, and the combination of LRGs and ELGs increases the number density and reduces the shot noise. We developed a pipeline to merge the overlapping tracers using galaxy bias as an approximately optimal weight and tested the pipeline on a suite of Abacus simulations, calibrated on the final version of the DESI Early Data Release. When applying our pipeline to the DESI DR1 catalog, we find an improvement in the BAO constraints of 11% for α iso and ∼ 7.0% for α AP consistent with our findings in mock catalogs. Our analysis was integrated into the DESI DR1 BAO analysis to produce theLRG+ELG result in the 0.8 < z < 1.1 redshift bin, which provided the most precise BAO measurement from DESI DR1 with a 0.86% constraint on the BAO distance scale and a 9.1σ detection of the isotropic BAO feature.

baryon acoustic oscillations↗

DOE OSTI2025

DESI 2024 V: Full-Shape galaxy clustering from galaxies and quasars

We present the measurements and cosmological implications of the galaxy two-point clustering using over 4.7 million unique galaxy and quasar redshifts in the range 0.1 < z < 2.1 divided into six redshift bins over a ∼ 7,500 square degree footprint, from the first year of observations with the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI Data Release 1). By fitting the full power spectrum, we extend previous DESI DR1 baryon acoustic oscillation (BAO) measurements to include redshift-space distortions and signals from the matter-radiation equality scale. For the first time, this Full-Shape analysis is blinded at the catalogue-level to avoid confirmation bias and the systematic errors are accounted for at the two-point clustering level, which automatically propagates them into any cosmological parameter. When analyzing the data in terms of compressed model-agnostic variables, we obtain a combined precision of 4.7% on the amplitude of the redshift space distortion (RSD) signal reaching a similar precision with just one year of DESI data than with twenty years of observation from the previous generation survey. We also analyze the data to directly constrain the cosmological parameters within the ΛCDM model using perturbation theory and combine this information with the reconstructed DESI DR1 galaxy BAO. Using a Big Bang Nucleosynthesis Gaussian prior on the baryon density parameter, ω b , and a weak Gaussian prior on the spectral index, n s , we constrain the matter density is Ω m = 0.296±0.010 and the Hubble constant H 0 = (68.63 ± 0.79)[km s -1 Mpc -1 ]. Additionally, we measure the amplitude of clustering σ 8 = 0.841±0.034. The DESI DR1 galaxy clustering results are in agreement with the ΛCDM model based on general relativity with parameters consistent with those from Planck. The cosmological interpretation of these results in combination with DESI DR1 Ly-α forest data and external datasets are presented in the companion paper [1].

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

DESI 2024 VII: cosmological constraints from the full-shape modeling of clustering measurements

We present cosmological results from the measurement of clustering of galaxy, quasar and Lyman-α forest tracers from the first year of observations with the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI Data Release 1). We adopt the full-shape (FS) modeling of the power spectrum, including the effects of redshift-space distortions, in an analysis which has been thoroughly validated in a series of supporting papers as summarised in [1]. We combine the full-shape information with DESI's DR1 constraints from the baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) of these tracers. In the flat ΛCDM cosmological model, DESI (FS+BAO), combined with a baryon density prior from Big Bang Nucleosynthesis and a weak prior on the scalar spectral index, determines matter density to Ω m = 0.2962 ± 0.0095, and the amplitude of mass fluctuations to σ 8 = 0.842 ± 0.034. The addition of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) data tightens these constraints to Ω m = 0.3056 ± 0.0049 and σ 8 = 0.8121 ± 0.0053, while further addition of the joint clustering and lensing analysis from the Dark Energy Survey Year-3 (DESY3) data further improves these measurements, and leads to a 0.4% determination of the Hubble constant, H 0 = (68.40 ± 0.27) km s -1 Mpc -1 . In models with a time-varying dark energy equation of state parametrised by w 0 and w a , combinations of DESI (FS+BAO) with CMB and type Ia supernovae continue to show the preference, previously found in the DESI DR1 BAO analysis, for w 0 > -1 and w a < 0 with similar levels of significance. DESI data, in combination with the CMB, improve the upper limits on the sum of the neutrino masses relative to the case when only the DR1 BAO was available, giving ∑m ν < 0.071 eV at 95% confidence. We finally constrain deviations from general relativity represented by two modified gravity parameters. DESI (FS+BAO) data alone measure the parameter that controls the clustering of massive particles, μ 0 = 0.11 +0.45 -0.54 , in agreement with the zero value predicted by general relativity. The combination of DESI with the CMB and the clustering and lensing analysis from DESY3 constrains both modified-gravity parameters, giving μ 0 = 0.04 ± 0.22 and Σ 0 = 0.044 ± 0.047, again in agreement with general relativity.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

DESI 2024 II: sample definitions, characteristics, and two-point clustering statistics

We present the samples of galaxies and quasars used for DESI 2024 cosmological analyses, drawn from the DESI Data Release 1 (DR1). We describe the construction of largescale structure (LSS) catalogs from these samples, which include matched sets of synthetic reference ‘randoms’ and weights that account for variations in the observed density of the samples due to experimental design and varying instrument performance. We detail how we correct for variations in observational completeness, the input ‘target’ densities due to imaging systematics, and the ability to confidently measure redshifts from DESI spectra. We then summarize how remaining uncertainties in the corrections can be translated to systematic uncertainties for particular analyses. We describe the weights added to maximize the signalto-noise of DESI DR1 2-point clustering measurements. We detail measurement pipelines applied to the LSS catalogs that obtain 2-point clustering measurements in configuration and Fourier space. The resulting 2-point measurements depend on window functions and normalization constraints particular to each sample, and we present the corrections required to match models to the data. We compare the configuration- and Fourier-space 2-point clustering of the data samples to that recovered from simulations of DESI DR1 and find they are, generally, in statistical agreement to within 2% in the inferred real-space over-density field. The LSS catalogs, 2-point measurements, and their covariance matrices will be released publicly with DESI DR1.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Mitigating imaging systematics for DESI 2024 emission Line Galaxies and beyond

Emission Line Galaxies (ELGs) are one of the main tracers that the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) uses to probe the universe. However, they are afflicted by strong spurious correlations between target density and observing conditions known as imaging systematics. In this paper, we present the imaging systematics mitigation applied to the DESI Data Release 1 (DR1) large-scale structure catalogs used in the DESI 2024 cosmological analyses. We also explore extensions of the fiducial treatment. This includes a combined approach, through forward image simulations (Obiwan) in conjunction with neural network-based regression, to obtain an angular selection function that mitigates the imaging systematics observed in the DESI DR1 ELGs target density. We further derive a line of sight selection function from the forward model that removes the strong redshift dependence between imaging systematics and low redshift ELGs. Combining both angular and redshift-dependent systematics, we construct a three-dimensional selection function and assess the impact of all selection functions on clustering statistics. We quantify differences between these extended treatments and the fiducial treatment in terms of the measured 2-point statistics. We find that the results are generally consistent with the fiducial treatment and conclude that the differences are far less than the imaging systematics uncertainty included in DESI 2024 full-shape measurements. We extend our investigation to the ELGs at 0.6 < z < 0.8, i.e., beyond the redshift range (0.8 < z < 1.6) adopted for the DESI clustering catalog, and demonstrate that determining the full three-dimensional selection function is necessary in this redshift range. Our tests showed that all changes are consistent with statistical noise for BAO analyses indicating they are robust to even severe imaging systematics. Specific tests for the full-shape analysis will be presented in a companion paper.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Analytical and EZmock covariance validation for the DESI 2024 results

The estimation of uncertainties in cosmological parameters is an important challenge in Large-Scale-Structure (LSS) analyses. For standard analyses such as Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) and Full-Shape two approaches are usually considered. First: analytical estimates of the covariance matrix use Gaussian approximations and (nonlinear) clustering measurements to estimate the matrix, which allows a relatively fast and computationally cheap way to generate matrices that adapt to an arbitrary clustering measurement. On the other hand, sample covariances are an empirical estimate of the matrix based on an ensemble of clustering measurements from fast and approximate simulations. While more computationally expensive due to the large amount of simulations and volume required, these allow us to take into account systematics that are impossible to model analytically. In this work we compare these two approaches in order to enable DESI's key analyses. We find that the configuration space analytical estimate performs satisfactorily in BAO analyses and its flexibility in terms of input clustering makes it the fiducial choice for DESI's 2024 BAO analysis. On the contrary, the analytical computation of the covariance matrix in Fourier space does not reproduce the expected measurements in terms of Full-Shape analyses, which motivates the use of a corrected mock covariance for DESI's 2024 Full Shape analysis.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

DESI 2024 III: baryon acoustic oscillations from galaxies and quasars

We present the DESI 2024 galaxy and quasar baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) measurements using over 5.7 million unique galaxy and quasar redshifts in the range 0.1 < z < 2.1. Divided by tracer type, we utilize 300,017 galaxies from the magnitude-limited Bright Galaxy Survey with 0.1 < z < 0.4, 2,138,600 Luminous Red Galaxies with 0.4 < z < 1.1, 2,432,022 Emission Line Galaxies with 0.8 < z < 1.6, and 856,652 quasars with 0.8 < z < 2.1, over a ∼ 7,500 square degree footprint. The analysis was blinded at the catalog-level to avoid confirmation bias. All fiducial choices of the BAO fitting and reconstruction methodology, as well as the size of the systematic errors, were determined on the basis of the tests with mock catalogs and the blinded data catalogs. We present several improvements to the BAO analysis pipeline, including enhancing the BAO fitting and reconstruction methods in a more physically-motivated direction, and also present results using combinations of tracers. We employ a unified BAO analysis method across all tracers. We present a re-analysis of SDSS BOSS and eBOSS results applying the improved DESI methodology and find scatter consistent with the level of the quoted SDSS theoretical systematic uncertainties. With the total effective survey volume of ∼ 18 Gpc3, the combined precision of the BAO measurements across the six different redshift bins is ∼0.52%, marking a 1.2-fold improvement over the previous state-of-the-art results using only first-year data. We detect the BAO in all of these six redshift bins. The highest significance of BAO detection is 9.1σ at the effective redshift of 0.93, with a constraint of 0.86% placed on the BAO scale. We find that our observed BAO scales are systematically larger than the prediction of the Planck 2018-ΛCDM at z < 0.8. We translate the results into transverse comoving distance and radial Hubble distance measurements, which are used to constrain cosmological models in our companion paper.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

DESI 2024 IV: Baryon Acoustic Oscillations from the Lyman alpha forest

We present the measurement of Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) from the Lyman-α(Lyα) forest of high-redshift quasars with the first-year dataset of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). Our analysis uses over 420 000 Lyα forest spectra and their correlation with the spatial distribution of more than 700 000 quasars. An essential facet of this work is the development of a new analysis methodology on a blinded dataset. We conducted rigorous tests using synthetic data to ensure the reliability of our methodology and findings before unblinding. Additionally, we conducted multiple data splits to assess the consistency of the results and scrutinized various analysis approaches to confirm their robustness. For a given value of the sound horizon (r d ), we measure the expansion at z eff = 2.33 with 2% precision, H(z eff ) = (239.2 ± 4.8) (147.09 Mpc /r d ) km/s/Mpc. Similarly, we present a 2.4% measurement of the transverse comoving distance to the same redshift, DM(z eff ) = (5.84 ± 0.14) (r d /147.09 Mpc) Gpc. Together with other DESI BAO measurements at lower redshifts, these results are used in a companion paper to constrain cosmological parameters.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Fiducial-cosmology-dependent systematics for the DESI 2024 BAO analysis

When measuring the Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) scale from galaxy surveys, one typically assumes a fiducial cosmology when converting redshift measurements into comoving distances and also when defining input parameters for the reconstruction algorithm. A parameterised template for the model to be fitted is also created based on a (possibly different) fiducial cosmology. This model reliance can be considered a form of data compression, and the data is then analysed allowing that the true answer is different from the fiducial cosmology assumed. In this study, we evaluate the impact of the fiducial cosmology assumed in the BAO analysis of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) survey Data Release 1 (DR1) on the final measurements in DESI 2024 III. We utilise a suite of mock galaxy catalogues with survey realism that mirrors the DESI DR1 tracers: the bright galaxy sample (BGS), the luminous red galaxies (LRG), the emission line galaxies (ELG) and the quasars (QSO), spanning a redshift range from 0.1 to 2.1. We compare the four secondary AbacusSummit cosmologies against DESI's fiducial cosmology (Planck 2018). The secondary cosmologies explored include a lower cold dark matter density, a thawing dark energy universe, a higher number of effective species, and a lower amplitude of matter clustering. The mocks are processed through the BAO pipeline by consistently iterating the grid, template, and reconstruction reference cosmologies. We determine a conservative systematic contribution to the error of 0.1% for both the isotropic and anisotropic dilation parameters αiso and αAP. We then directly test the impact of the fiducial cosmology on DESI DR1 data.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Semi-analytical covariance matrices for two-point correlation function for DESI 2024 data

We present an optimized way of producing the fast semi-analytical covariance matrices for the Legendre moments of the two-point correlation function, taking into account survey geometry and mimicking the non-Gaussian effects. We validate the approach on simulated (mock) catalogs for different galaxy types, representative of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Data Release 1, used in 2024 analyses. We find only a few percent differences between the mock sample covariance matrix and our results, which can be expected given the approximate nature of the mocks, although we do identify discrepancies between the shot-noise properties of the DESI fiber assignment algorithm and the faster approximation (emulator) used in the mocks. Importantly, we find a close agreement (≤ 8% relative differences) in the projected errorbars for distance scale parameters for the baryon acoustic oscillation measurements. This confirms our method as an attractive alternative to simulation-based covariance matrices, especially for non-standard models or galaxy sample selections, making it particularly relevant to the broad current and future analyses of DESI data.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗