Gravitational arcs as a perturbation of the perfect ring

TL;DR

This paper presents a perturbative method to model gravitational arcs caused by non-symmetrical potentials, simplifying the analysis by focusing on deviations from perfect rings and accurately reproducing arc features.

Contribution

It introduces a perturbative approach to model gravitational arcs as deviations from perfect rings, improving simplicity and accuracy in representing arcs and caustics.

Findings

Perturbative approach accurately reproduces arc contours and caustics.

Modeling of tangential arcs can be simplified using this perturbative method.

Caustic line equation depends only on the lens displacement field on the circle.

Abstract

The image of a point situated at the center of a circularly symmetric potential is a perfect circle. The perturbative effect of non-symmetrical potential terms is to displace and break the perfect circle. These 2 effects, displacement and breaking are directly related to the Taylor expansion of the perturbation at first order on the circle. The numerical accuracy of this perturbative approach is tested in the case of an elliptical potential with a core radius. The contour of the images and the caustics lines are well re-produced by the perturbative approach. These results suggests that the modeling of arcs, and in particular of tangential arcs may be simplified by using a general perturbative representation on the circle. An interesting feature of the perturbative approach, is that the equation of the caustic line depends only on the values on the circle of the lens displacement field along the $\theta$ direction.