Clustering of dark matter halos on the light-cone: scale-, time- and mass-dependence of the halo biasing in the Hubble volume simulations

Abstract

We develop a phenomenological model to predict the clustering of dark matter halos on the light-cone by combining several existing theoretical models. Assuming that the velocity field of halos on large scales is approximated by linear theory, we propose an empirical prescription of a scale-, mass-, and time-dependence of halo biasing. We test our model against the Hubble Volume $N$-body simulation and examine its validity and limitations. We find a good agreement in two-point correlation functions of dark matter halos between the phenomenological model predictions and measurements from the simulation for $R>5h^{-1}$Mpc both in the real and redshift spaces. Although calibrated on the mass scale of groups and clusters and for redshifts up to $z\sim2$, the model is quite general and can be applied to a wider range of astrophysical objects, such as galaxies and quasars, if the relation between dark halos and visible objects is specified.