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| Format: | Preprint |
| Published: |
2025
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| Online Access: | https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02009 |
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| _version_ | 1866912686653046784 |
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| author | McArthur, Everett Millon, Martin Powell, Meredith Wechsler, Risa H. Pan, Zhiwei Siudek, Małgorzata Spiller, Jonas Aguilar, Jessica Nicole Ahlen, Steven Anand, Abhijeet BenZvi, Segev Bianchi, Davide Brooks, David Claybaugh, Todd Cuceu, Andrei de la Macorra, Axel Dey, Arjun Doel, Peter Font-Ribera, Andreu Forero-Romero, Jaime E. Gaztañaga, Enrique Gontcho, Satya Gontcho A Gutierrez, Gaston Herrera-Alcantar, Hiram K. Honscheid, Klaus Ishak, Mustapha Joyce, Dick Juneau, Stephanie Kirkby, David Kisner, Theodore Kremin, Anthony Lahav, Ofer Lamman, Claire Landriau, Martin Guillou, Laurent Le Manera, Marc Meisner, Aaron Miquel, Ramon Nadathur, Seshadri Palanque-Delabrouille, Nathalie Percival, Will Poppett, Claire Prada, Francisco Pérez-Ràfols, Ignasi Rossi, Graziano Sanchez, Eusebio Schlegel, David Schubnell, Michael Seo, Hee-Jong Silber, Joseph Harry Sprayberry, David Tarlé, Gregory Weaver, Benjamin Alan Zhou, Rongpu Zou, Hu |
| author_facet | McArthur, Everett Millon, Martin Powell, Meredith Wechsler, Risa H. Pan, Zhiwei Siudek, Małgorzata Spiller, Jonas Aguilar, Jessica Nicole Ahlen, Steven Anand, Abhijeet BenZvi, Segev Bianchi, Davide Brooks, David Claybaugh, Todd Cuceu, Andrei de la Macorra, Axel Dey, Arjun Doel, Peter Font-Ribera, Andreu Forero-Romero, Jaime E. Gaztañaga, Enrique Gontcho, Satya Gontcho A Gutierrez, Gaston Herrera-Alcantar, Hiram K. Honscheid, Klaus Ishak, Mustapha Joyce, Dick Juneau, Stephanie Kirkby, David Kisner, Theodore Kremin, Anthony Lahav, Ofer Lamman, Claire Landriau, Martin Guillou, Laurent Le Manera, Marc Meisner, Aaron Miquel, Ramon Nadathur, Seshadri Palanque-Delabrouille, Nathalie Percival, Will Poppett, Claire Prada, Francisco Pérez-Ràfols, Ignasi Rossi, Graziano Sanchez, Eusebio Schlegel, David Schubnell, Michael Seo, Hee-Jong Silber, Joseph Harry Sprayberry, David Tarlé, Gregory Weaver, Benjamin Alan Zhou, Rongpu Zou, Hu |
| contents | Quasars acting as strong gravitational lenses offer a rare opportunity to probe the redshift evolution of scaling relations between supermassive black holes and their host galaxies, particularly the $M_{\mathrm{BH}}$--$M_{\mathrm{host}}$ relation. Using these powerful probes, the mass of the host galaxy can be precisely inferred from the Einstein radius $θ_{\mathrm{E}}$. Using 812{,}118 quasars from DESI DR1 ($0.03 \leq z \leq 1.8$), we searched for quasars lensing higher-redshift galaxies by identifying background emission-line features in their spectra. To detect these rare systems, we trained a convolutional neural network (CNN) on mock lenses constructed from real DESI spectra of quasars and emission-line galaxies (ELGs), achieving a high classification performance (AUC = 0.99). We also trained a regression network to estimate the redshift of the background ELG. Applying this pipeline, we identified seven high-quality (Grade~A) lens candidates, each exhibiting a strong [O\,\textsc{ii}] doublet at a higher redshift than the foreground quasar; four candidates additionally show H$β$ and [O\,\textsc{iii}] emission. These results significantly expand the sample of quasar lens candidates beyond the twelve identified and three confirmed in previous work, and demonstrate the potential for scalable, data-driven discovery of quasars as strong lenses in upcoming spectroscopic surveys. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_02009 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Quasars acting as Strong Lenses Found in DESI DR1 McArthur, Everett Millon, Martin Powell, Meredith Wechsler, Risa H. Pan, Zhiwei Siudek, Małgorzata Spiller, Jonas Aguilar, Jessica Nicole Ahlen, Steven Anand, Abhijeet BenZvi, Segev Bianchi, Davide Brooks, David Claybaugh, Todd Cuceu, Andrei de la Macorra, Axel Dey, Arjun Doel, Peter Font-Ribera, Andreu Forero-Romero, Jaime E. Gaztañaga, Enrique Gontcho, Satya Gontcho A Gutierrez, Gaston Herrera-Alcantar, Hiram K. Honscheid, Klaus Ishak, Mustapha Joyce, Dick Juneau, Stephanie Kirkby, David Kisner, Theodore Kremin, Anthony Lahav, Ofer Lamman, Claire Landriau, Martin Guillou, Laurent Le Manera, Marc Meisner, Aaron Miquel, Ramon Nadathur, Seshadri Palanque-Delabrouille, Nathalie Percival, Will Poppett, Claire Prada, Francisco Pérez-Ràfols, Ignasi Rossi, Graziano Sanchez, Eusebio Schlegel, David Schubnell, Michael Seo, Hee-Jong Silber, Joseph Harry Sprayberry, David Tarlé, Gregory Weaver, Benjamin Alan Zhou, Rongpu Zou, Hu Astrophysics of Galaxies Quasars acting as strong gravitational lenses offer a rare opportunity to probe the redshift evolution of scaling relations between supermassive black holes and their host galaxies, particularly the $M_{\mathrm{BH}}$--$M_{\mathrm{host}}$ relation. Using these powerful probes, the mass of the host galaxy can be precisely inferred from the Einstein radius $θ_{\mathrm{E}}$. Using 812{,}118 quasars from DESI DR1 ($0.03 \leq z \leq 1.8$), we searched for quasars lensing higher-redshift galaxies by identifying background emission-line features in their spectra. To detect these rare systems, we trained a convolutional neural network (CNN) on mock lenses constructed from real DESI spectra of quasars and emission-line galaxies (ELGs), achieving a high classification performance (AUC = 0.99). We also trained a regression network to estimate the redshift of the background ELG. Applying this pipeline, we identified seven high-quality (Grade~A) lens candidates, each exhibiting a strong [O\,\textsc{ii}] doublet at a higher redshift than the foreground quasar; four candidates additionally show H$β$ and [O\,\textsc{iii}] emission. These results significantly expand the sample of quasar lens candidates beyond the twelve identified and three confirmed in previous work, and demonstrate the potential for scalable, data-driven discovery of quasars as strong lenses in upcoming spectroscopic surveys. |
| title | Quasars acting as Strong Lenses Found in DESI DR1 |
| topic | Astrophysics of Galaxies |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02009 |