Exploring the mass to light ratio of massive galaxies with the Rubin DP0 preview dataset

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory will perform the 10-year long Legacy Survey of Space and Time expected to begin in 2023/24. LSST will cover the Southern Hemisphere, collecting over two million images with an 8.4-meter telescope and 3200-pixel camera. In collaboration with the scientific community and based on the Outer Rim Simulation (Heitmann et al. ApJS, 245, 16, 2019), the Rubin Observatory released a simulated dataset (DP0) of the data that is expected to be in hand at the 5-year mark. Using this simulated dataset, we explore the number and luminosity of the most massive galaxies at several redshift intervals. By comparing with the ”truth tables’ from the underlying simulations, we assess the mass to light ratio for this set. When the observatory comes online, we will be able to use this work to identify a sample of massive, early universe galaxies that will be good candidates for finding the dynamical mass with spectroscopic follow-up. Eventually, this will help determine whether the mass to light ratio of massive high-z galaxies is like that of today’s galaxies.