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We report the discovery of the quadruply lensed quasar SDSS J1433+6007 (RA =14:33:22.8, Dec.=+60:07:13.44), mined in the SDSS DR12 photometric catalogues using a novel outlierselection technique, without prior spectroscopic or ultraviolet excess information. Discovery data obtained at the Nordic Optical Telescope (La Palma) show nearly identical quasar spectra at zs = 2.737 ± 0.003 and four quasar images in a fold configuration, one of which sits on a blue arc, with maximum separation 3.6 arcsec. The deflector redshift is zl = 0.407 ± 0.002, from Keck-ESI spectra. We describe the selection procedure, discovery and follow-up, image positions and BVRi magnitudes, and first results and forecasts from lens model fit to the relative image positions.

We present a tomographic analysis of metal absorption lines arising from the circumgalactic medium (CGM) of galaxies at z ≈ 0.5–2, using Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) observations of two background quasars at z ≈ 2.2 and 2.8, which are two of the few currently known quasars with multiple images due to strong gravitational lensing by galaxy clusters at z ≈ 0.6 and 0.5, respectively. The angular separations between different pairs of quasar multiple images enable us to probe the absorption over transverse physical separations of ≈0.4–150 kpc, which are based on strong lensing models exploiting MUSE observations. The fractional difference in rest-frame equivalent width (Δ W r) of Mg  ii , Fe  ii , and C  iv absorption increases on average with physical separation, indicating that the metal-enriched gaseous structures become less coherent with distance, with a likely coherence length-scale of ≈10 kpc. However, Δ W r for all the ions vary considerably over ≈0.08–0.9, indicating a clumpy CGM over the full range of length-scales probed. At the same time, paired Mg  ii absorption is detected across ≈100–150 kpc at similar line-of-sight velocities, which could be probing cool gas clouds within the same halo. No significant dependence of Δ W r is found on the equivalent width and redshift of the absorbing gas and on the galaxy environment associated with the absorption. The high-ionization gas phase traced by C  iv shows a higher degree of coherence than the low-ionization gas phase traced by Mg  ii , with ≈90 per cent of C  iv systems exhibiting Δ W r ≤ 0.5 at separations ≤10 kpc compared to ≈50 per cent of Mg  ii systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]