Forward-modelling galaxy colors

The next generation of large-scale galaxy surveys will observe hundreds of millions of galaxies with both unprecedented precision. Fully exploiting these surveys will require a precise control of systematics and pushing cosmological analysis towards highly non-linear scales. To do so, I am working on forward-modelling galaxy observations, i.e. producing synthetic galaxy catalogs presenting the same properties as actual galaxies from observations.

Publications:

• Hearin A. P., Chaves-Montero J., Becker M. R., Alarcon A., 2021, OJA, 4, 1, 7. doi:10.21105/astro.2105.05859.
  Summary: differentiable, precise empirical model for the assembly of individual and populations of dark matter halos, the latter capturing both average mass growth and the diversity of assembly histories.
• Chaves-Montero J., Hearin A., 2021, MNRAS, 506, 2373. doi:10.1093/mnras/stab1831.
  Summary: short-term star formation fluctuations modify the colors of individual galaxies substantially, but present very little impact on the colors of galaxy populations. We provide an expression to forecast the impact of these fluctuations on the colors of individual galaxies.
• Chaves-Montero J., Hearin A., 2020, MNRAS, 495, 2088. doi:10.1093/mnras/staa1230.
  Summary: star formation variations modify galaxy colours along a single direction in color space, and the position of a galaxy along this direction is regulated by the fraction of stellar mass formed over the last billion years.