Euclid: The linear-construction covariance and cosmology

Lindholm, V.; Sihvola, E.; Valiviita, J.; Fumagalli, A.; Altieri, B.; Andreon, S.; Auricchio, N.; Baccigalupi, C.; Baldi, M.; Bardelli, S.; Battaglia, P.; Biviano, A.; Branchini, E.; Brescia, M.; Camera, S.; Capobianco, V.; Carbone, C.; Cardone, V. F.; Carretero, J.; Casas, S.; Castellano, M.; Castignani, G.; Cavuoti, S.; Chambers, K. C.; Cimatti, A.; Colodro-Conde, C.; Congedo, G.; Conversi, L.; Copin, Y.; Courbin, F.; Courtois, H. M.; Da Silva, A.; Degaudenzi, H.; De Lucia, G.; Dole, H.; Dubath, F.; Dupac, X.; Dusini, S.; Escoffier, S.; Farina, M.; Farinelli, R.; Ferriol, S.; Finelli, F.; Fosalba, P.; Fotopoulou, S.; Frailis, M.; Franceschi, E.; Fumana, M.; Galeotta, S.; George, K.; Gillis, B.; Giocoli, C.; Gracia-Carpio, J.; Grazian, A.; Grupp, F.; Haugan, S. V. H.; Holmes, W.; Hormuth, F.; Hornstrup, A.; Jahnke, K.; Jhabvala, M.; Kermiche, S.; Kiessling, A.; Kubik, B.; Kunz, M.; Kurki-Suonio, H.; Le Brun, A. M. C.; Ligori, S.; Lilje, P. B.; Lloro, I.; Mainetti, G.; Maiorano, E.; Mansutti, O.; Marcin, S.; Marggraf, O.; Martinelli, M.; Martinet, N.; Marulli, F.; Massey, R. J.; Medinaceli, E.; Mei, S.; Melchior, M.; Meneghetti, M.; Merlin, E.; Meylan, G.; Mora, A.; Moresco, M.; Moscardini, L.; Nakajima, R.; Neissner, C.; Niemi, S.-M.; Padilla, C.; Paltani, S.; Pasian, F.; Pedersen, K.; Pettorino, V.; Pires, S.; Polenta, G.; Poncet, M.; Popa, L. A. et al.
Bibliographical reference

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Advertised on:
10
2026
Number of authors
140
IAC number of authors
1
Citations
0
Refereed citations
0
Description
We study the properties of galaxy cluster two-point correlation function covariance matrices estimated using the linear-construction (LC) method, which is computationally up to 20 times faster than the standard sample-covariance method. Our goal is to assess how well the LC method performs in cosmological parameter estimation compared to the sample covariance. We used a set of 1000 mock dark matter halo catalogues to compute both the LC-covariance and the sample-covariance estimates in four redshift shells. These numerical matrices were used to fit a theoretical four-parameter model for the covariance. We then used the two fitted covariance models in a likelihood function to estimate two cosmological parameters -- the matter density parameter Ωm and the amplitude of the matter density fluctuations σ8 -- from the simulated mock catalogues. The purpose of this was to validate the LC-covariance-based model against the sample-covariance model. The catalogues were simulated assuming the spatially flat ΛCDM cosmology, with Ωm = 0.30711 and σ8 = 0.8288. We find that the parameter posteriors obtained using the sample- and LC-covariance models agree well with each other and with the simulation cosmology. The two pairs of marginalised constraints are Ωm = 0.307 ± 0.003 and σ8 = 0.826 ± 0.009 (sample covariance), and Ωm = 0.308 ± 0.003 and σ8 = 0.825 ± 0.009 (LC covariance). The posterior widths are the same, and the difference in the median values is less than 0.16σ for both parameters. ★ This paper is published on behalf of the Euclid Consortium.