H  i constraints from the cross-correlation of eBOSS galaxies and Green Bank Telescope intensity maps
                        
                    
                    
                    
                    
                            ABSTRACT We present the joint analysis of Neutral Hydrogen (H i) Intensity Mapping observations with three galaxy samples: the Luminous Red Galaxy (LRG) and Emission Line Galaxy (ELG) samples from the eBOSS survey, and the WiggleZ Dark Energy Survey sample. The H i intensity maps are Green Bank Telescope observations of the redshifted $$21\rm cm$$ emission on $$100 \, {\rm deg}^2$$ covering the redshift range 0.6 < z < 1.0. We process the data by separating and removing the foregrounds present in the radio frequencies with FastI ICA. We verify the quality of the foreground separation with mock realizations, and construct a transfer function to correct for the effects of foreground removal on the H i signal. We cross-correlate the cleaned H i data with the galaxy samples and study the overall amplitude as well as the scale dependence of the power spectrum. We also qualitatively compare our findings with the predictions by a semianalytical galaxy evolution simulation. The cross-correlations constrain the quantity $$\Omega _{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} b_{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} r_{\rm {H\,\small {I}},{\rm opt}}$$ at an effective scale keff, where $$\Omega _\rm {H\,\small {I}}$$ is the H  i density fraction, $$b_\rm {H\,\small {I}}$$ is the H i bias, and $$r_{\rm {H\,\small {I}},{\rm opt}}$$ the galaxy–hydrogen correlation coefficient, which is dependent on the H  i content of the optical galaxy sample. At $$k_{\rm eff}=0.31 \, h\,{\rm Mpc^{-1}}$$ we find $$\Omega _{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} b_{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} r_{\rm {H\,\small {I}},{\rm Wig}} = [0.58 \pm 0.09 \, {\rm (stat) \pm 0.05 \, {\rm (sys)}}] \times 10^{-3}$$ for GBT-WiggleZ, $$\Omega _{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} b_{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} r_{\rm {H\,\small {I}},{\rm ELG}} = [0.40 \pm 0.09 \, {\rm (stat) \pm 0.04 \, {\rm (sys)}}] \times 10^{-3}$$ for GBT-ELG, and $$\Omega _{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} b_{\rm {H\,\small {I}}} r_{\rm {H\,\small {I}},{\rm LRG}} = [0.35 \pm 0.08 \, {\rm (stat) \pm 0.03 \, {\rm (sys)}}] \times 10^{-3}$$ for GBT-LRG, at z ≃ 0.8. We also report results at $$k_{\rm eff}=0.24$$ and $$k_{\rm eff}=0.48 \, h\,{\rm Mpc^{-1}}$$. With little information on H i parameters beyond our local Universe, these are amongst the most precise constraints on neutral hydrogen density fluctuations in an underexplored redshift range. 
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