Physics Commons^™

Modeling Weak Gravitational Lensing Through C++, Christopher Cepero

Undergraduate Review

Gravitational Lensing has become an integral part of astrophysics and the study of matter in the universe. In weak gravitational lensing, an object appears distorted when viewed from the observer’s perspective. This is caused by the bundle of light being distorted by an object of considerable mass. Because the distance to each part of this bundle is not the same, the rays of light are affected differently causing a shearing and magnification of the image. This alteration in the image we see can be modeled using the thin lens approximation. By integrating the equations for light travel based on general …