AtLAST -- A five fold increase in the number of identified Strongly Lensed Galaxies in the sub-millimetre and its consequences

TL;DR

The paper discusses how the AtLAST telescope could dramatically increase the number of known strongly lensed galaxies in the submillimeter range, enabling advances in cosmology and galaxy evolution studies.

Contribution

It proposes that AtLAST can significantly expand the sample of strongly lensed galaxies, overcoming current limitations of small, heterogeneous samples from previous surveys.

Findings

Potential to identify thousands of new SLGs with AtLAST

Enhanced ability to study high-redshift dusty galaxies

Improved constraints on cosmological models

Abstract

Strong gravitational lensing is a powerful probe of cosmology, dark matter (DM), and high-redshift galaxy evolution, but current samples of strongly lensed galaxies (SLGs) remain far too small to exploit its full potential. $\textit{Herschel}$'s submillimeter (submm) surveys demonstrated that submm selection provides the most efficient and least biased route to identifying high-redshift SLGs, yet produced only a few hundred systems over limited, heterogeneous fields. Achieving the thousands of SLGs required for precision cosmology and detailed studies of distant dusty star-forming galaxies demands a new, wide-area, homogeneous sub-mm survey. A facility like AtLAST, capable of extending $\textit{Herschel}$-like methodologies to much larger areas, is uniquely positioned to deliver the order-of-magnitude increase in SLG numbers needed for transformative progress.