Euclid: Measuring the intrinsic alignment of galaxies around cosmic voids in the \Euclid Flagship simulation\

Abstract

We present a methodology to measure the intrinsic alignment (IA) signal of galaxies in the vicinity of cosmic voids using the \Euclid-like Flagship cosmological simulation from the Euclid Consortium. The IA signal is quantified and compared with the predictions of the linear alignment (LA) model, providing one of the first detailed investigations of this effect in underdense large-scale environments. While the IA signal around cosmic voids has received little attention to date, it may constitute a non-negligible systematic in forthcoming cosmological analyses that exploit void-lensing measurements. Our analysis examines red and blue galaxy populations separately, enabling a comparison of their alignment behaviour in void environments with the corresponding trends measured in galaxy-galaxy correlations. We find that the redshift evolution of the IA amplitude in cosmic voids is broadly consistent with that measured in the general galaxy population for both colour-selected samples. Additionally, our modelling allows us to estimate the linear bias of voids, $b_{\rm V}(z)$ which characterises how cosmic voids trace the underlying dark-matter density field, for voids with radii in the range $10 < R_{\rm V}/(h^{-1} {\rm Mpc}) < 15$. The measured bias exhibits a positive trend with redshift, consistent with theoretical predictions for the clustering of underdense regions. These results highlight the importance of accurately modelling IA in void studies, both to mitigate systematic effects in void-lensing cosmology and to further improve our understanding of galaxy-environment interactions in low-density regions of the Universe.