Paper detail

Predicting the number of giant arcs expected in the next generation wide-field surveys from space

In this paper we estimate the number of gravitational arcs detectable in a wide-field survey such as that which will be operated by the Euclid space mission, assuming a ΛCDM cosmology. We use the publicly available code MOKA to obtain realistic deflection angle maps of mock gravitational lenses. The maps are processed by a ray-tracing code to estimate the strong lensing cross sections of each lens. Our procedure involves 1) the generation of a light-cone which is populated with lenses drawn from a theoretical mass-function; 2) the modeling of each single lens using a triaxial halo with a NFW (Navarro-Frenk-White) density profile and theoretical concentration-mass relation, including substructures, 3) the determination of the lensing cross section as a function of redshift for each lens in the light-cone, 4) the simulation of mock observations to characterize the redshift distribution of sources that will be detectable in the Euclid images. We focus on the so-called giant arcs, i.e. gravitational arcs characterized by large length-to-width ratios (l/w > 5, 7.5 and 10). We quantify the arc detectability at different significances above the level of the background. Performing 128 different realizations of a 15,000 sq. degree survey, we find that the number of arcs detectable at 1σ above the local background will be 8912,2914, and 1275 for l/w>5, 7.5 and 10, respectively. The expected arc numbers decrease to 2409, 790, and 346 for a detection limit at 3σ above the background level. From our analysis, we find that most of the lenses which contribute to the lensing optical depth are located at redshifts 0.4<zl<0.7 and that the 50% of the arcs are images of sources at zs > 3. This is the first step towards the full characterization of the population of strong lenses that will be observed by Euclid. [abridged]