Topological statistics and the liquid-mirror telescope galaxy redshift project

The results of numerical simulations are presented which demonstrate that l iquid-mirror telescope galaxy redshift surveys such as the current UBC-NASA multi-narrow-band survey and the future Large Zenith Telescope (LZT) surve y have the potential of discriminating between the predictions of different theories of structure formation. Most of the currently studied theories of structure formation predict a scale-invariant spectrum of primordial pertu rbations. Therefore, to distinguish between the predictions of the various models, we make use of statistics that are sensitive to non-Gaussian phases , such as the counts-in-cell statistics, N-galaxy probability functions and Minkowski functionals. It is shown that already the current UBC-NASA surve y can clearly differentiate between the predictions of some topological def ect theories and those of inflationary Universe models with Gaussian phases .