Forecast for FAST: from galaxies survey to intensity mapping

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST) is the largest single-dish radio telescope in the world. In this paper, we make forecast on the FAST H i large-scale structure survey by mock observations. We consider a drift scan survey with the L-band 19 beam receiver, which may be commensal with the pulsar search and Galactic H i survey. We also consider surveys at lower frequency, using either the current single feed wide-band receiver or a future multibeam phased array feed (PAF) in the UHF band. We estimate the number density of detected H i galaxies and the measurement error in positions and the precision of the surveys are evaluated using both Fisher matrix and simulated observations. The measurement error in the H i galaxy power spectrum is estimated, and we find that the error is relatively large even at moderate redshifts, as the number of positively detected galaxies drops drastically with increasing redshift. However, good cosmological measurement could be obtained with the intensity mapping technique where the large scale H i distribution is measured without resolving individual galaxies. The figure of merit for the dark energy equation of state with different observation times is estimated, and we find that with the existing L-band multibeam receiver, a good measurement of low redshift large-scale structure can be obtained, which complements the existing optical surveys. With a PAF in the UHF band, the constraint can be much stronger, reaching the level of a dark energy task force stage IV experiment.