Testing Local Anisotropy Using the Method of Smoothed Residuals I - Methodology

Abstract

We discuss some details regarding the method of smoothed residuals, which has recently been used to search for anisotropic signals in low-redshift distance measurements (Supernovae). In this short note we focus on some details regarding the implementation of the method, particularly the issue of effectively detecting signals in data that are inhomogeneously distributed on the sky. Using simulated data, we argue that the original method proposed in Colin et al. [1] will not detect spurious signals due to incomplete sky coverage, and that introducing additional Gaussian weighting to the statistic as in [2] can hinder its ability to detect a signal. Issues related to the width of the Gaussian smoothing are also discussed.

8 pages, 2 figures, 1 table, references added, matches final version published in JCAP

References in corpus (8)

• Spectra and Light Curves of Six Type Ia Supernovae at 0.511 < z < 1.12 and the Union2 Compilation
• Cosmic Microwave Background Quadrupole and Ellipsoidal Universe
• Ellipsoidal Universe Can Solve The CMB Quadrupole Problem
• Anisotropic Dark Energy: Dynamics of Background and Perturbations
• Dipole of the luminosity distance: a direct measure of H(z)
• Measuring cosmic bulk flows with Type Ia Supernovae from the Nearby Supernova Factory
• Probing Dark Energy Anisotropy
• On the Possibility of Anisotropic Curvature in Cosmology

Cited by in corpus (10)

• Probing the isotropy of cosmic acceleration traced by Type Ia supernovae
• Hints of a Local Matter Underdensity or Modified Gravity in the Low $z$ Pantheon data
• Anisotropy of the Universe via the Pantheon supernovae sample revisited
• The significance of anisotropic signals hiding in the type Ia supernovae
• Probing bulk flow with nearby SNe Ia data
• Light propagation in a homogeneous and anisotropic universe
• Testing Isotropy in the Local Universe
• Weak-lensing by the large scale structure in a spatially anisotropic universe: theory and predictions
• Probing the Cosmological Principle with weak lensing shear
• Star-Crossed Labours: Checking Consistency Between Current Supernovae Compilations