A Python package for the characterization and comparison of cosmic voids

FEDERICO BUSTILLOS; SEBASTIÁN GUALPA; JUAN CABRAL; ANDRÉS N. RUIZ; BRUNO SANCHEZ; DANTE PAZ

Encuentro; XIII Edition of the Friends of Friends Meeting; 2024

Cosmic voids are regions of the Universe that contain very few galaxies in their interiors, forminglarge expanses of relatively empty space. The study of these structures allows an understanding ofthe formation and dynamics of the Cosmic Web, making inferences about global cosmology, testingtheories of galaxy formation and evolution, and testing modified gravity models. There are variousalgorithms for identifying cosmic voids in the literature. Some are based on the identification ofvoids as low-density regions using galaxies as tracers. Although there are a large number of studiescarried out on cosmological voids, in general each study uses its own identification method and itsown parameters, making comparison very difficult. Although there have been initiatives to carryout a comparison, there is still no tool that allows the comparison of the results of various methods in a direct way. A Python software package is presented that integrates various public algorithmsto characterize voids and represent them in a common and comparable way independent of theirgeometry. The implementation consists of a common interface that allows, for the same set oftracers, to determine whether or not a tracer belongs to a void defined by a selected algorithm,making a more direct comparison of the results possible.