GraL: Searching Gravitationally Lensed QSOs with Gaia Astrometry, Quantum Computing, and Beyond
Alberto Krone-Martins
University of California, US
What is the value of the Hubble constant? How does Dark Matter clump on small scales? Multiply imaged and gravitationally lensed QSOs are central objects to help answer these questions and serve as fundamental tools with far-reaching implications across a wide spectrum of research domains. However, these objects are rare and elusive, with barely a few hundred currently known. The GraL group was created to tackle this issue, discovering and characterizing new lensed QSOs profiting from the ESA/Gaia satellite's exceptional angular resolution and all-sky coverage.
In this talk, I will first briefly overview the major motivations behind our search for lensed QSOs. Then I will comment on some machine learning heuristics we created to keep humans in the decision loop and to profit from Gaia’s unparalleled astrometry and its synergies with ground and space-based surveys and follow-up observations. Afterward, I will discuss our adoption of currently available Quantum Annealers as DWAVE Advantage, which have been essential to cope with the challenge of training models from very few examples, and prospects for classical supercomputers as SDSC Expanse. Finally, I will show some recently discovered and confirmed lenses thanks to Gaia DR3 and discuss exciting prospects for the upcoming Gaia Data Releases and beyond.
After undergrad studies in Physics at the IF/USP, Alberto Krone-Martins followed to an MSc in Astrophysics at IAG/USP and then to a double-degree Ph.D. in Astrometry and Astrophysics between IAG/USP and the Université de Bordeaux in France. Then he passed through postdoc and staff positions at the Universidade de Lisboa and Caltech, finally landing at the University of California, Irvine, where he teaches at the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences. Alberto’s interdisciplinary work lies at the intersection between astrometry, astrophysics, computing, and engineering. He is one of the co-chairs of Cosmostatistics Initiative COIN, of the GraL gravitational lens program, and a long-time member of the Gaia space mission Data Processing and Analysis Consortium.
Google Meet: https://meet.google.com/pcw-gmem-jyi
Link da transmissão: https://www.youtube.com/c/AstronomiaIAGUSP/live