Key Probes of the Extreme Universe: Accretion Discs, Gravitational Waves, CMB and Galaxy Surveys

这项拨款提案旨在推进对天体物理盘的理解，对引力波的分析，以及对CMB和星系调查的科学利用，以打开宇宙结构的新窗口。以下是我们提出的项目摘要：在年轻的恒星（行星形成的地方）和星系中心的黑洞周围发现了气体盘。这个项目将研究轨道运动是椭圆的或不对齐的圆盘的行为和外观，导致气体被反复挤压。行星是由围绕新生的年轻恒星旋转的气体和尘埃形成的，这是一个复杂的多方面的过程，人们对它的了解仍然很少。这个项目研究了湍流、磁场和喷流如何影响这些圆盘内部区域的行星形成。宇宙中的许多物体会吸积围绕它们运行的气体。这个项目将研究有物质表面的物体上的吸积，如白矮星、年轻的恒星和行星，当气体必须通过所谓的边界层时，这一边界层仍然知之甚少。2015年LIGO探测到的引力波为探索宇宙开辟了前所未有的机会。从黑洞到神秘的暗物质和宇宙膨胀，我们将开发机器学习方法来探索我们生活的世界的新方面。基于我们世界领先的普朗克卫星管道来测量高斯（“钟形曲线”）统计的偏差，我们将对来自宇宙微波天空（西蒙斯天文台（SO））以及星系调查（暗能量调查（DES））的新数据实施扩展版本，同时寻找它们之间的预期相关性。结果将产生非线性聚类参数，对原始非高斯性的最严格约束和暴胀模型的关键检验。宇宙学观测为我们提供了一个独特的机会，可以在大爆炸的最初几分之一秒内探索高能物理和引力的量子机制。在理解宇宙学中物理基本原理的结果方面取得的突破最近导致了新的令人兴奋的非高斯统计预测，我们在这里面对的是大型宇宙学数据集，特别是来自宇宙微波天空的数据集（西蒙斯天文台）。在这个项目中，我们将使用最先进的西蒙斯天文台实验，对宇宙微波背景的透镜效应进行新的测量，即大爆炸遗留光的引力偏转。利用我们的新方法来提取和反转透镜偏转，我们将提供一个更清晰的宇宙起源和未知质量的中微子粒子的视图。

This grant proposal seeks to advance the understanding of astrophysical discs, the analysis of gravitational waves, and the science exploitation of the CMB and galaxy surveys in order to open new windows on the structure of the Universe. The following are summaries of our proposed projects:1. Discs of gas are found around young stars (where planets form) and around black holes in the centres of galaxies. This project will investigate the behaviour and appearance of discs in which the orbital motion is elliptical or misaligned, causing the gas to be squeezed repeatedly.2. Planets form from the gas and dust swirling around newly born young stars, a complicated multi-faceted process that is still poorly understood. This project investigates how turbulence, magnetic fields, and jets influence planet formation in the inner regions of these disks.3. Many objects in the Universe accrete gas that orbits around them. This project will study accretion onto objects with a material surface, such as white dwarfs, young stars and planets, when the gas must pass through the so-called boundary layer which is still poorly understood.4. The detection of gravitational waves by LIGO in 2015 has opened up unprecedented opportunities for the exploration of the Universe. From black holes to the enigmatic dark matter and cosmological expansion, we will develop machine learning methods to explore new facets of the world we live in.5. Building on our world-leading Planck satellite pipeline to measure deviations from Gaussian ("bell-curve") statistics, we will implement extended versions for new data from the cosmic microwave sky (Simons Observatory (SO)), as well as galaxy surveys (Dark Energy Survey (DES)), while also looking for the expected correlations between them. The results will yield non-linear clustering parameters, the tightest constraints on primordial non-Gaussianity and critical tests for inflationary models.6. Cosmological observations offer us the unique opportunity to probe high-energy physics and the quantum regime of gravity during the first fraction of a second of the Big Bang. Breakthroughs in understanding the consequences of fundamental principles of physics in cosmology have very recently led to new exciting predictions of non-Gaussian statistics which we here confront with large cosmological datasets, specifically from the cosmic microwave sky (Simons Observatory).7. In this project, we will make new measurements of the lensing of the cosmic microwave background, the gravitational deflection of relic light from the Big Bang, using the state-of-the-art Simons Observatory experiment. With our novel methods for extracting and inverting the lensing deflection, we will provide a clearer view of the beginning of the universe and the unknown mass of neutrino particles.