U.S. - Japan Joint Seminar: Cosmology with the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect

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O244144CarlstromThis award supports the participation of American scientists in a U.S.-Japan joint seminar on cosmology with the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect (SZE) to be held in Kiyosato, Japan from June 16-20, 2003. The co-organizers are Professor John Carlstrom at the University of Chicago and Professor Naoki Itoh at Sophia University in Tokyo, Japan. The meeting will bring together research scientists from the U.S. and Japan, two countries where new instrumentation and technologies, as well as new theoretical developments in this area of science are now emerging as a powerful probe of cosmology. The Japanese participants will include Dr. Rashid A. Sunyaev, the father of the field. The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect is a small spectral distortion of the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation (the remnant glow from the big bang) due to its interaction with large-scale structure as the radiation traversed the universe. The SZE can be used as a powerful probe of cosmology as it provides a sensitive probe of the formation and evolution history of structure in the universes. The co-organizers have complementary scientific expertise in the field. This enables them to evaluate and attract the best physical scientists to participate. It is expected that the new SZE surveys offer an independent method for probing the properties of the enigmatic dark energy which is believe to be the dominate energy density in the universe today and yet defies explanation by conventional physics. The seminar organizers have made a special effort to involve a large number of postdocs and graduate students as both participants and observers. The exchange of ideas and data with Japanese experts in the field will enable U.S. participants to advance their own work, and will set the stage for future collaborative projects. Following the seminar the organizers plan to establish a workshop web page. Conference proceedings will be published on this web site.