Constraining the Halo Mass of Damped Lyα Absorption Systems (DLAs) at z = 2–3.5 Using the Quasar-CMB Lensing Cross-correlation

Abstract

We study the cross-correlation of damped Ly α systems (DLAs) and their background quasars, using the most updated DLA catalog and the Planck 2018 CMB lensing convergence field. Our measurement suggests that the DLA bias is smaller than 3.1, corresponding to at a confidence of 90%. These constraints are broadly consistent with Alonso et al. and previous measurements by cross-correlation between DLAs and the Ly α forest (e.g., Font-Ribera et al.; Prez-Rfols et al.). Further, our results demonstrate the potential of obtaining a more precise measurement of the halo mass of the high-redshift sources using next generation CMB experiments with a higher angular resolution. The python-based codes and data products of our analysis are available at https://github.com/LittleLin1999/CMB-lensingxDLA .