Statistical Techniques for the Analysis of High Resolution CMB Data

该项目是普林斯顿大学和加泰罗尼亚空间研究所（西班牙巴塞罗那）之间的国际合作，旨在开发统计工具来分析来自阿塔卡马宇宙望远镜（ACT）的数据，该望远镜是由美国国家科学基金会资助的，位于智利的阿塔卡马沙漠。这些技术虽然是针对ACT的数据，但对于分析任何高分辨率的宇宙微波背景（CMB）实验都是有用的。用这些工具进行的第一次测量将是微波背景温度波动的功率谱，以及视线范围内的质量波动。通过将模拟与分析理论相结合，研究小组将计算完整的协方差矩阵及其逆，并计算不同宇宙模型的观测值的可能性。将这些技术应用于ACT数据将改进对宇宙质量密度、原子密度、暗能量特性和中微子特性的测量。测量暗能量和暗物质可以让我们深入了解基础物理学和宇宙的命运。测量CMB的波动和结构的增长打开了一扇通往大爆炸最初时刻的窗口。这些结果可能会引起广泛的兴趣，即使这项研究训练本科生和研究生广泛应用的统计技术，并使他们参与实质性的国际合作。随着数据的发布，用户友好的可能性软件将帮助一大批宇宙学家、天体物理学家和粒子物理学家。

AST-0707731SpergelThis project is an international collaboration between Princeton University and Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya (Barcelona, Spain) to develop statistical tools to analyze data from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT), an NSF-funded telescope in the Atacama Desert of Chile. The techniques, although tuned to the ACT data, will be useful for analyzing any high-resolution Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) experiment. The first measurements made with these tools will be the power spectrum of temperature fluctuations in the microwave background, and mass fluctuations along the line-of-sight. By combining simulations and analytical theory, the research group will compute the full covariance matrix and its inverse, and compute the likelihood of the observed values for diverse cosmological models. Applying these techniques to the ACT data will improve measurements of the mass density of the Universe, the density of atoms, the properties of the dark energy, and the properties of the neutrino.Measuring dark energy and dark matter provides insight into fundamental physics and the fate of the universe. Measuring CMB fluctuations and the growth of structure opens a window to the earliest moments of the big bang. These results will likely be of broad popular interest, even as this research trains undergraduate and graduate students in widely applicable statistical techniques, and engages them in a substantive international collaboration. Releasing the user friendly likelihood software along with the data will help a broad group of cosmologists, astrophysicists, and particle physicists.