The clustering of the SDSS-IV extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey DR14 quasar sample: anisotropic clustering analysis in configuration space

• Published in: Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Vol. 480; no. 2; pp. 2521 - 2534
• Main Authors: Hou, Jiamin, Sánchez, Ariel G, Scoccimarro, Román, Salazar-Albornoz, Salvador, Burtin, Etienne, Gil-Marín, Héctor, Percival, Will J, Ruggeri, Rossana, Zarrouk, Pauline, Zhao, Gong-Bo, Bautista, Julian, Brinkmann, Jonathan, Brownstein, Joel R, Dawson, Kyle S, Devi, N Chandrachani, Myers, Adam D, Habib, Salman, Heitmann, Katrin, Tojeiro, Rita, Rossi, Graziano, Schneider, Donald P, Seo, Hee-Jong, Wang, Yuting
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United Kingdom Oxford University Press (OUP): Policy P - Oxford Open Option A 01.10.2018; Oxford University Press
• Subjects: Astronomy & Astrophysics; ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS; Astrophysics; Physics; data analysis; cosmology; large-scale structure of Universe; quasars
• ISSN: 0035-8711; 1365-2966
• DOI: 10.1093/mnras/sty1984

We explore the cosmological implications of anisotropic clustering measurements of the quasar sample from Data Release 14 (DR14) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey IV extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (eBOSS) in configuration space. The |${\sim } 147\, 000$| quasar sample observed by eBOSS offers a direct tracer of the density field and bridges the gap of previous baryon acoustic oscillation measurements between redshift 0.8 < |$z$| < 2.2. By analysing the two-point correlation function characterized by clustering wedges |$\xi _{\rm w_i}(s)$| and multipoles ξ_ℓ(s), we measure the angular diameter distance, Hubble parameter, and cosmic structure growth rate. We define a systematic error budget for our measurements based on the analysis of N-body simulations and mock catalogues. Based on the DR14 large-scale structure quasar sample at the effective redshift |$z$|_eff = 1.52, we find the growth rate of cosmic structure fσ_8(⁠|$z$|_eff) = 0.396 ± 0.079, and the geometric parameters D_V(⁠|$z$|⁠)/r_d = 26.47 ± 1.23, and F_AP(⁠|$z$|⁠) = 2.53 ± 0.22, where the uncertainties include both statistical and systematic errors. These values are in excellent agreement with the best-fitting standard Λ cold dark matter model to the latest cosmic microwave background data from Planck.