Subhalo abundance matching in $f(R)$ gravity

Abstract

Using the liminality N-body simulations of Shi et. al., we present the first predictions for galaxy clustering in $f(R)$ gravity using subhalo abundance matching. We find that, for a given galaxy density, even for an $f(R)$ model with $f_{R0}=-10^{-6}$, for which the cold dark matter clustering is very similar to $\Lambda$CDM, the predicted clustering of galaxies in the $f(R)$ model is very different from $\Lambda$CDM. The deviation can be as large as $40\%$ for samples with mean densities close to that of $L_*$ galaxies. This large deviation is testable given the accuracy that future large-scale galaxy surveys aim to achieve. Our result demonstrates that galaxy surveys can provide a stringent test of General Relativity on cosmological scales, which is comparable to the tests from local astrophysical observations.