Constraints on cosmological parameters from the analysis of the cosmic lens all sky survey radio-selected gravitational lens statistics

Automation of finding strong gravitational lenses in the Kilo Degree Survey with U - DenseLens (DenseLens + Segmentation)

In the context of upcoming large-scale surveys like Euclid, the necessity for the automation of strong lens detection is essential. While existing machine learning pipelines heavily rely on the classification probability (P), this study intends to address the importance of integrating additional metrics, such as Information Content (IC) and the number of pixels above the segmentation threshold ([Formula: see text]), to alleviate the false positive rate in unbalanced data-sets. In this work, we introduce a segmentation algorithm (U-Net) as a supplementary step in the established strong gravitational lens identification pipeline (Denselens), which primarily utilizes [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] parameters for the detection and ranking. The results demonstrate that the inclusion of segmentation enables significant reduction of false positives by approximately 25 per cent in the final sample extracted from DenseLens, without compromising the identification of strong lenses. The main objective of this study is to automate the strong lens detection process by integrating these three metrics. To achieve this, a decision tree-based selection process is introduced, applied to the Kilo Degree Survey (KiDS) data. This process involves rank-ordering based on classification scores ([Formula: see text]), filtering based on Information Content ([Formula: see text]), and segmentation score ([Formula: see text]). Additionally, the study presents 14 newly discovered strong lensing candidates identified by the U-Denselens network using the KiDS DR4 data.

Taxonomy of Dark Energy Models

The accelerated expansion of the Universe is one of the main discoveries of the past decades, indicating the presence of an unknown component: the dark energy. Evidence of its presence is being gathered by a succession of observational experiments with increasing precision in its measurements. However, the most accepted model for explaining the dynamic of our Universe, the so-called Lambda cold dark matter, faces several problems related to the nature of such energy component. This has led to a growing exploration of alternative models attempting to solve those drawbacks. In this review, we briefly summarize the characteristics of a (non-exhaustive) list of dark energy models as well as some of the most used cosmological samples. Next, we discuss how to constrain each model’s parameters using observational data. Finally, we summarize the status of dark energy modeling.

Strong gravitational lensing of explosive transients

Recent rapid progress in time domain surveys makes it possible to detect various types of explosive transients in the Universe in large numbers, some of which will be gravitationally lensed into multiple images. Although a large number of strongly lensed distant galaxies and quasars have already been discovered, strong lensing of explosive transients opens up new applications, including improved measurements of cosmological parameters, powerful probes of small scale structure of the Universe, and new observational tests of dark matter scenarios, thanks to their rapidly evolving light curves as well as their compact sizes. In particular, compact sizes of emitting regions of these transient events indicate that wave optics effects play an important role in some cases, which can lead to totally new applications of these lensing events. Recently we have witnessed first discoveries of strongly lensed supernovae, and strong lensing events of other types of explosive transients such as gamma-ray bursts, fast radio bursts, and gravitational waves from compact binary mergers are expected to be observed soon. In this review article, we summarize the current state of research on strong gravitational lensing of explosive transients and discuss future prospects.

Dark energy two decades after: observables, probes, consistency tests

The discovery of the accelerating universe in the late 1990s was a watershed moment in modern cosmology, as it indicated the presence of a fundamentally new, dominant contribution to the energy budget of the universe. Evidence for dark energy, the new component that causes the acceleration, has since become extremely strong, owing to an impressive variety of increasingly precise measurements of the expansion history and the growth of structure in the universe. Still, one of the central challenges of modern cosmology is to shed light on the physical mechanism behind the accelerating universe. In this review, we briefly summarize the developments that led to the discovery of dark energy. Next, we discuss the parametric descriptions of dark energy and the cosmological tests that allow us to better understand its nature. We then review the cosmological probes of dark energy. For each probe, we briefly discuss the physics behind it and its prospects for measuring dark energy properties. We end with a summary of the current status of dark energy research.