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In a strong gravitational lensing system, the distorted light from a source is analysed to infer the properties of the lens. However, light emitted by the lens itself can contaminate the image of the source, introducing systematic errors in the analysis. We present a simple and efficient lens light model based on the well-tested multi-Gaussian expansion (MGE) method for representing galaxy surface brightness profiles, which we combine with a semi-linear inversion scheme for pixelized source modelling. Testing it against realistic mock lensing images, we show that our scheme can fit the lensed images to the noise level, with relative differences between the true input and best-fitting lens light model remaining below 5 per cent. We apply the MGE lens light model to 38 lenses from the HST SLACS sample. We find that the new scheme provides a good fit for the majority of the sample with only 3 exceptions – these show clear asymmetric residuals in the lens light. We examine the radial dependence of the ellipticity and position angles and confirm that it is common for a typical lens galaxy to exhibit twisting non-elliptical isophotes and boxy / disky isophotes. Our MGE lens light model will be a valuable tool for understanding the hidden complexity of the lens mass distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distribution of mass in galaxy-scale strong gravitational lenses is often modelled as an elliptical power-law plus 'external shear', which notionally accounts for neighbouring galaxies and cosmic shear along our line of sight. A small amount of external shear could come from these sources, but we show that the vast majority does not. Except in a handful of rare systems, the best-fitting values do not correlate with independent measurements of line-of-sight shear: from weak lensing in 45 Hubble Space Telescope images, or in 50 mock images of lenses with complex distributions of mass. Instead, the best-fit external shear is aligned with the major or minor axis of 88 per cent of lens galaxies; and the amplitude of the external shear increases if that galaxy is discy. We conclude that 'external shear' attached to a power-law model is not physically meaningful, but a fudge to compensate for lack of model complexity. Since it biases other model parameters that are interpreted as physically meaningful in several science analyses (e.g. measuring galaxy evolution, dark matter physics or cosmological parameters), we recommend that future studies of galaxy-scale strong lensing should employ more flexible mass models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cold dark matter (DM) model predicts that every galaxy contains thousands of DM subhaloes; almost all other DM models include a physical process that smooths away the subhaloes. The subhaloes are invisible, but could be detected via strong gravitational lensing, if they lie on the line of sight to a multiply imaged background source, and perturb its apparent shape. We present a predominantly automated strong lens analysis framework, and scan for DM subhaloes in Hubble Space Telescope imaging of 54 strong lenses. We identify five DM subhalo candidates, including two especially compelling candidates (one previously known in SLACS0946 + 1006) where a subhalo is favoured after all of our tests for systematics. We find that the detectability of subhaloes depends upon the assumed parametric form for the lens galaxy's mass distribution, especially its degree of azimuthal freedom. Using separate components for DM and stellar mass reveals two DM subhalo candidates and removes four false positives compared to the single power-law mass model that is common in the literature. We identify 45 lenses without substructures, the number of which is key to statistical tests able to rule out models of, for example, warm or self-interacting DM. Our full analysis results are available at https://github.com/Jammy2211/autolens_subhalo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fast growth of supermassive black holes and their feedback to the host galaxies play an important role in regulating the evolution of galaxies, especially in the early Universe. However, due to cosmological dimming and the limited angular resolution of most observations, it is difficult to resolve the feedback from the active galactic nuclei (AGNs) to their host galaxies. Gravitational lensing, for its magnification, provides a powerful tool to spatially differentiate emission originating from AGN and host galaxy at high-redshifts. Here, we report a discovery of a jet-like radio structure in a strongly lensed starburst quasar, H1413+117 or Cloverleaf at redshift z  = 2.56, based on observational data at optical, submillimetre, and radio wavelengths. With both parametric and non-parametric lens models and with reconstructed images in the source plane, we find a well-separated, kpc-scaled, single-sided radio jet located at projected |${\sim }1.2\, \mathrm{kpc}$| to the north-west of the host galaxy in the source plane. This could indicate the co-existence of feedback from the AGN by both wind and jet in the Cloverleaf quasar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Observations suggest that the dark matter and stars in early-type galaxies 'conspire' to produce a surprisingly simple distribution of total mass, ρ(r) ∝ ρ−γ, with γ ≈ 2. We measure the distribution of mass in 48 early-type galaxies that gravitationally lens a resolved background source. By fitting the source light in every pixel of images from the Hubble Space Telescope , we find a mean |$\langle \gamma \rangle =2.075_{-0.024}^{+0.023}$| with an intrinsic scatter between galaxies of |$\sigma _\gamma =0.172^{+0.022}_{-0.032}$| for the overall sample. This is consistent with and has similar precision to traditional techniques that employ spectroscopic observations to supplement lensing with mass estimates from stellar dynamics. Comparing measurements of γ for individual lenses using both techniques, we find a statistically insignificant correlation of |$-0.150^{+0.223}_{-0.217}$| between the two, indicating a lack of statistical power or deviations from a power-law density in certain lenses. At fixed surface mass density, we measure a redshift dependence, |$\partial \langle \gamma \rangle /\partial z=0.345^{+0.322}_{-0.296}$|⁠ , that is consistent with traditional techniques for the same sample of Sloan Lens ACS and GALaxy-Lyα EmitteR sYstems (GALLERY) lenses. Interestingly, the consistency breaks down when we measure the dependence of γ on the surface mass density of a lens galaxy. We argue that this is tentative evidence for an inflection point in the total mass-density profile at a few times the galaxy effective radius – breaking the conspiracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate how strong gravitational lensing can test contemporary models of massive elliptical (ME) galaxy formation, by combining a traditional decomposition of their visible stellar distribution with a lensing analysis of their mass distribution. As a proof of concept, we study a sample of three ME lenses, observing that all are composed of two distinct baryonic structures, a 'red' central bulge surrounded by an extended envelope of stellar material. Whilst these two components look photometrically similar, their distinct lensing effects permit a clean decomposition of their mass structure. This allows us to infer two key pieces of information about each lens galaxy: (i) the stellar mass distribution (without invoking stellar populations models) and (ii) the inner dark matter halo mass. We argue that these two measurements are crucial to testing models of ME formation, as the stellar mass profile provides a diagnostic of baryonic accretion and feedback whilst the dark matter mass places each galaxy in the context of LCDM large-scale structure formation. We also detect large rotational offsets between the two stellar components and a lopsidedness in their outer mass distributions, which hold further information on the evolution of each ME. Finally, we discuss how this approach can be extended to galaxies of all Hubble types and what implication our results have for studies of strong gravitational lensing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]