A search for gravitationally lensed quasars and quasar pairs in Pan-STARRS1: spectroscopy and sources of shear in the diamond 2M1134−2103

Abstract

Abstract We present results of a systematic search for gravitationally lensed quasars in Pan-STARRS1. Our final sample of candidates comprises of 91 systems, not including 25 rediscovered lensed quasars and quasar pairs. In the absence of spectroscopy to verify the lensing nature of the candidates, the main sources of contaminants are likely to be quasar pairs, which we consider to be a byproduct of our work, and a smaller number of quasar + star associations. Among the independently discovered quads is 2M1134−2103, for which we obtained spectroscopy for the first time, finding a redshift of 2.77 for the quasar. There is evidence for microlensing in at least one image. We perform detailed mass modelling of this system using archival imaging data, and find that the unusually large shear responsible for the diamond-like configuration can be attributed mainly to a faint companion ∼4 arcsec away, and to a galaxy group/cluster ∼30 arcsec away. We also set limits of z ∼ 0.5–1.5 on the redshift of the lensing galaxy, based on its brightness, the image separation of the lensed images, and an analysis of the observed photometric flux ratios.