CAREER: Sharing Deep CMB Maps for Cosmological Discovery

了解我们宇宙的起源仍然是天体物理学家的主要追求，这样的宇宙学研究促进了我们对基础物理学的掌握，这反过来又导致了加速我国经济的技术进步。该项目专注于宇宙微波背景(CMB)偏振的深层地图，这为宇宙学和基础物理学提供了巨大的机会。大多数宇宙学家认为，整个可见宇宙是由亚核体积的超光速“膨胀”在几分之一秒内产生的。膨胀产生了宇宙引力背景(CGB)，现在可以通过印在程度尺度CMB偏振的“B模式”图案上的微弱信号来检测到。它们的幅度直接测量了膨胀大爆炸的能量尺度。探测CGB的偏振信号可能是当今宇宙学最重要的目标。在极小的尺度上，CMB偏振跟踪了高红移宇宙的引力透镜，测量了早期的暗能量和中微子质量。在它们重叠的地方，这种测量将允许对膨胀的CGB搜索进行分离，从而能够更好地限制膨胀物理。BICEP/SPUD在南极进行的一系列实验朝着这一重要的科学目标追求了有针对性的战略。BICEP1提供了目前公布的最好的B型模式通胀上限。科瓦克博士现在是BICEP2和SPUD合作项目的首席研究员(PI)，负责现场工作、操作和分析数据。组合的BICEP2/SPUD系统将其灵敏度集中在一个小的前景清洁区域，以优化对CGB的搜索。随着其他CMB极化调查在不久的将来上线，对重叠地图的联合分析的需求将会增长。考虑到B模式检测的主要影响，任何说法都需要通过独立实验之间严格的地图水平比较来证实。分离极化的银河系发射和消除引力透镜对B模式特征的贡献也需要联合使用调查。暗能量和中微子的研究以及其他科学目标促使CMB图与光学和射电宇宙学测量相关联。该项目寻求共享来自SPUD、BICEP2、BICEP1和DASI的超深CMB偏振图。它开发和传播完整的数据产品和软件工具，扩大这些探路调查的使用和影响，同时为其他国家制定预期有用的标准。该项目旨在得出所需的便携式数据产品和软件工具，在与包括小组委员会在内的外部合作者的重叠地图的关键联合分析中对它们进行测试，与整个天体物理学界分享这些产品和软件，并鼓励独立的再分析。在上述科学目标的强烈推动下，天体物理界的这种重新分析也可能产生意想不到的发现。这个项目通过直接扩大CMB科学的受众，将教育与研究结合在一起。PI将在CMB针对本科生的非常成功的发现实验室的基础上开发和共享可移植课程，该实验室将用于许多本科教学机构。国际天文学协会还将通过世界望远镜发布早期宇宙的虚拟之旅和互动的深CMB地图，这些地图可以直接拍摄原始引力波的图像，世界望远镜是一种用于公共和中学教育推广的基于网络的天文学可视化工具。该项目为一名研究生和博士后研究员提供培训，他们将在教育和研究计划的这些和其他内容上与私人投资密切合作。

Understanding the origin of our Universe remains a primary quest of astrophysicists, and such studies of cosmology advance our mastery of fundamental physics, which in turn leads to technological advances that accelerate our nation's economy. This project focuses on deep maps of cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization that offer tremendous opportunities for cosmology and fundamental physics. Most cosmologists believe that the entire observable Universe was spawned in a fraction of a second by the superluminal "inflation" of a subnuclear volume. Inflation produced a cosmic gravitational background (CGB) that may be detectable now via the faint signature imprinted in "B-mode" patterns of degree-scale CMB polarization. Their amplitude directly measures the energy scale of the inflationary Big Bang. Detecting the polarization signature of the CGB may be the most important goal in cosmology today. At arcminute scales CMB polarization traces gravitational lensing from the high redshift Universe, measuring early dark energy and neutrino mass. Where they overlap, such measurements will allow delensing of inflationary CGB searches, enabling better constraints of inflationary physics.The BICEP/SPUD series of experiments operating from the South Pole have pursued a targeted strategy toward this important science goal. BICEP1 produced the best current published upper limit on inflation from B-modes. Dr. Kovac is now principal investigator (PI) of the collaboration that fielded, operates, and analyzes data from BICEP2 and SPUD. The combined BICEP2/SPUD system concentrates its sensitivity on a small foreground-clean region to optimize the search for the CGB. As other CMB polarization surveys come online in the near future, demand will grow for joint analysis of overlapping maps. Given the major implications of a B-mode detection, any claim will need to be confirmed by rigorous map-level comparisons among independent experiments. Separation of polarized Galactic emission and removal of contributions of gravitational lensing to the B-mode signature also require the joint use of surveys. The study of dark energy and neutrinos and other science goals motivate correlation of CMB maps with optical and radio cosmological surveys.This project seeks to share ultra-deep CMB polarization maps from SPUD, BICEP2, BICEP1, and DASI. It develops and disseminates complete data products and software tools that broaden the use and impact of those pathfinding surveys while setting what are expected to be useful standards for others to do the same. This project aims to derive the needed portable data products and software tools, to test them in key joint analyses of overlapping maps with external collaborators including SPT, to share them with the full astrophysics community, and to encourage independent reanalysis. Such reanalysis by the astrophysics community, strongly motivated by the science goals above, may also yield unanticipated discoveries.This project integrates education with research by directly broadening the audience for CMB science. The PI will develop and share a portable curriculum based on a highly successful CMB discovery laboratory aimed at undergraduate students, which will be used across many undergraduate teaching institutions. The PI will also publish virtual tours of the early Universe and interactive deep CMB maps, which may directly image primordial gravitational waves, through the WorldWide Telescope, a web-based astronomy visualization tool used for public and secondary-school educational outreach. This project provides training for a graduate student and postdoctoral fellow who will work closely with the PI on these and other elements of the education and research plan.