Biasing from galaxy trough and peak profiles with the DES Y3 redMaGiC galaxies and the weak lensing mass map

ABSTRACT We measure the correspondence between the distribution of galaxies and matter around troughs and peaks in the projected galaxy density, by comparing redMaGiC galaxies ($0.15< z<0.65$) to weak lensing mass maps from the Dark Energy Survey (DES) Y3 data release. We obtain stacked profiles, as a function of angle $\theta$, of the galaxy density contrast $\delta _{\rm g}$ and the weak lensing convergence $\kappa$, in the vicinity of these identified troughs and peaks, referred to as ‘void’ and ‘cluster’ superstructures. The ratio of the profiles depend mildly on $\theta$, indicating good consistency between the profile shapes. We model the amplitude of this ratio using a function $F(\boldsymbol{\eta }, \theta)$ that depends on cosmological parameters $\boldsymbol{\eta }$, scaled by the galaxy bias. We construct templates of $F(\boldsymbol{\eta }, \theta)$ using a suite of N-body (Gower Street) simulations forward-modelled with DES Y3-like noise and systematics. We discuss and quantify the caveats of using a linear bias model to create galaxy maps from the simulation dark matter shells. We measure the galaxy bias in three lens tomographic bins (near to far): $2.32^{+0.86}_{-0.27}, 2.18^{+0.86}_{-0.23}, 1.86^{+0.82}_{-0.23}$ for voids, and $2.46^{+0.73}_{-0.27}, 3.55^{+0.96}_{-0.55}, 4.27^{+0.36}_{-1.14}$ for clusters, assuming the best-fitting Planck cosmology. Similar values with $\sim 0.1\sigma$ shifts are obtained assuming the mean DES Y3 cosmology. The biases from troughs and peaks are broadly consistent, although a larger bias is derived for peaks, which is also larger than those measured from the DES Y3 $3\times 2$-point analysis. This method shows an interesting avenue for measuring field-level bias that can be applied to future lensing surveys.