First Cosmology Results using Type Ia Supernova from the Dark Energy Survey: Simulations to Correct Supernova Distance Biases

Understand

We describe catalog-level simulations of Type Ia supernova (SN~Ia) light curves in the Dark Energy Survey Supernova Program (DES-SN), and in low-redshift samples from the Center for Astrophysics (CfA) and the Carnegie Supernova Project (CSP).

• These simulations are used to model biases from selection effects and light curve analysis, and to determine bias corrections for SN~Ia distance moduli that are used to measure cosmological parameters.
• To generate realistic light curves, the simulation uses a detailed SN~Ia model, incorporates information from observations (PSF, sky noise, zero point), and uses summary information (e.g., detection efficiency vs.
• signal to noise ratio) based on 10,000 fake SN light curves whose fluxes were overlaid on images and processed with our analysis pipelines.