Spatial and Angular Correlation Functions in Cosmology

Domenikiotis, Christos (1992) Spatial and Angular Correlation Functions in Cosmology. MSc(R) thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to study the role of the spatial and angular correlation functions for galaxies and clusters of galaxies. We discuss the various approaches to the problem of describing the statistical distribution of galaxies and discuss the connection between Peebles' and Limber's approach. The former describes the distribution as a point process, the latter considers the density distribution as a random function or process. The density distribution that corresponds to a particular spatial correlation function can be generated by use of spectral analysis. We discuss some of the problems involved in generating the density distribution in this way, and use this description to derive the relationship between the angular and the spatial correlation function for particular forms of the latter. Selection effects are introduced first by simply truncating all galaxies beyond a certain distance, and secondly by introducing the Schechter luminosity function and excluding galaxies whose apparent magnitude is above some threshold value. We briefly review the fractal description of galaxy distributions, and relate this to the description in terms of spatial correlation functions.

• Item Type: Thesis (MSc(R))
• Qualification Level: Masters
• Additional Information: Adviser: John F L Simmons
• Keywords: Astrophysics, Theoretical physics, Statistical physics
• Date of Award: 1992
• Depositing User: Enlighten Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:1992-75443
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 19 Nov 2019 20:06
• Last Modified: 19 Nov 2019 20:06
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/75443