Events Archive

Observations of the cosmic microwave background form the pillar of our current understanding of cosmology. Measurements of the temperature and polarization anisotropies of the CMB extending to small angular scales set tight constraints on cosmological parameters, probing both the standard LCDM model and the physics of inflation.

Zack Li, Princeton University
"ABS, ACT, and Planck via the Simons Observatory Power Spectrum Pipeline"

Every astrophysically realistic simulation needs accurate initial data and in this talk I will present methods to obtain such solutions for a variety of problems. In particular I will focus on a new initial data formulation to solve the full set of Einstein equations for spacetimes that contain a black hole under general conditions.

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) has produced the first image of the 1.3 mm-wavelength emission around the black hole "shadow" at the heart of M87.

Details to come...

Sign up for lunch https://forms.gle/axLZUeV7SF4muNpn8.

Abstract: The cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature bispectrum is currently the most precise tool for constraining non-Gaussianity (NG) in the primordial curvature perturbations.  The Planck temperature data tightly constrain the amplitude of local-type NG, as could be generated in (e.g.) multi-field inflation: f_NL^loc = 2.5 +/- 5.7. ...

I will discuss topics related to foregrounds of two different CMB science cases. For the first part, I will introduce an expansion to foreground SED parameterizations in terms of moments of the parameter distributions.

As cosmological measurements increase in precision, foregrounds are increasingly problematic. One foreground that's possible to reduce is Earth's atmosphere. I will talk about experiments that use stratospheric balloons to achieve higher sensitivity and lower systematic errors than are possible on the ground, and at much lower cost than in...