Probing the Dark Universe with Galaxies

The next generation of large photometric galaxy surveys is starting now: the Dark Energy Survey will map 300 million galaxies over the next 5 years, and LSST, starting as DES finishes, will map several billion galaxies over 1/2 the sky. These surveys will map the structure of the Universe over the last 10 billion years,  and in addition to the insight they will provide into galaxy evolution, can be used to probe the 95% of the Universe that consists of dark matter and dark energy.  Making full use of these data to understand the physics of the dark universe requires several key steps:  (1) a theoretical framework with which we can simulate and predict the underlying dark universe and the associated fundamental physics, (2) a tested empirical understanding of the connection between galaxies and the underlying dark components, which dominate the matter distribution, and (3) statistical constraints from observations of galaxies provided by large area sky surveys.  I will describe recent developments in our understanding of the relationship between galaxies and the matter distribution, current and future limits on cosmological parameters using the distribution of galaxies, and how we are using simulations and large galaxy surveys together to probe the dark side of the Universe.

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