H0LiCOW I. $H_0$ Lenses in COSMOGRAIL's Wellspring: Program Overview

• Main Authors: Suyu, S. H, Bonvin, V, Courbin, F, Fassnacht, C. D, Rusu, C. E, Sluse, D, Treu, T, Wong, K. C, Auger, M. W, Ding, X, Hilbert, S, Marshall, P. J, Rumbaugh, N, Sonnenfeld, A, Tewes, M, Tihhonova, O, Agnello, A, Blandford, R. D, Chen, G. C. -F, Collett, T, Koopmans, L. V. E, Liao, K, Meylan, G, Spiniello, C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 30-06-2016
• Subjects: Physics - Astrophysics of Galaxies; Physics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.1607.00017

Strong gravitational lens systems with time delays between the multiple
images allow measurements of time-delay distances, which are primarily
sensitive to the Hubble constant that is key to probing dark energy, neutrino
physics, and the spatial curvature of the Universe, as well as discovering new
physics. We present H0LiCOW ($H_0$ Lenses in COSMOGRAIL's Wellspring), a
program that aims to measure $H_0$ with $<3.5\%$ uncertainty from five lens
systems (B1608+656, RXJ1131-1231, HE0435-1223, WFI2033-4723 and HE1104-1805).
We have been acquiring (1) time delays through COSMOGRAIL and Very Large Array
monitoring, (2) high-resolution Hubble Space Telescope imaging for the lens
mass modeling, (3) wide-field imaging and spectroscopy to characterize the lens
environment, and (4) moderate-resolution spectroscopy to obtain the stellar
velocity dispersion of the lenses for mass modeling. In cosmological models
with one-parameter extension to flat $\Lambda$CDM, we expect to measure $H_0$
to $<3.5\%$ in most models, spatial curvature $\Omega_{\rm k}$ to 0.004, $w$ to
0.14, and the effective number of neutrino species to 0.2 (1$\sigma$
uncertainties) when combined with current CMB experiments. These are,
respectively, a factor of $\sim15$, $\sim2$, and $\sim1.5$ tighter than CMB
alone. Our data set will further enable us to study the stellar initial mass
function of the lens galaxies, and the co-evolution of supermassive black holes
and their host galaxies. This program will provide a foundation for extracting
cosmological distances from the hundreds of time-delay lenses that are expected
to be discovered in current and future surveys.