LEARNING OUTCOMES
The course gives you the theoretical basis to understand gravitational lensing as a physical phenomenon. You will understand the relation between lensing theory and observations, and how lensing can be used to extract cosmological information. You will have the conceptual basis that allows you to deepen your knowledge by reading further literature or publications.
CONTENT
Gravitational lensing is a powerful cosmological probe. This course is an introduction to the theory of gravitational lensing in the context of cosmology. The theory is built on the theory of general relativity, and on the FRW model of the universe. The focus is on cosmology, thus we will mainly be working at the weak-lensing limit, strong lensing is touched only briefly.
The course is motivated by Euclid, the European Space Agency’s satellite mission to probe the large scale structure and expansion history of the universe. The course forms a natural continuation to the course of Galaxy Survey Cosmology, but can also be taken individually.
Contents:
- Propagation of light in general relativity
- Lensing geometry and basic concepts
- Weak and strong lensing
- Magnification and distortion
- Relation to observations
- Lensing as a cosmological probe
- Shear field, E- and B-modes
- Lensing spectrum and correlation function
- Shear as a spin-2 field
