Collaborative Research: Analysis of data from the QUaD experiment

该提案寻求支持，以完成2005-2007年在美国阿蒙森-斯科特南极站进行的QUAD实验的数据分析。QUAD是一台安装在2.6米卡塞格伦望远镜上的31像素偏振敏感测辐射热相机，它正在绘制从5角分钟到2度的角度尺度上的宇宙微波背景(CMB)辐射的偏振地图。最近公布的第一季观测结果(2005年)改进了之前通过单独的小角尺度实验获得的任何结果。数据采集的第二个成功季节(2006年)现已完成，数据已进入分析的高级阶段。第三个观测季(2007年)刚刚结束，正在对数据进行初步检查，确定地面溢出的特征，并在傅立叶空间中通过适当的过滤器缓解其影响。经过处理和分析，这些数据将产生在200-2000多极范围内对CMB偏振光谱的最精确测量。这将允许详细测试早期宇宙中的标量波动是否如最简单的通胀模型所预测的那样是绝热的，或者是否存在显著的等温波动。QUAD还作为许多现代观测技术的探路者，这些技术将被未来的实验所需要，探测在寻求从张量模式中探测微弱的偏振信号时必须面对的系统效应。

The proposal seeks support to complete the analysis of data from the QUaD experiment located at the U.S. Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station in 2005-2007. QUaD is a 31-pixel polarization-sensitive bolometric camera mounted on a 2.6 meter Cassegrain telescope, which was making maps of the polarization in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation on angular scales from 5 angular minutes to 2 degrees. Recently released results from the first season of observations (2005) improve any previous results obtained by individual small angular scale experiments. A second successful season of data taking (2006) is now complete and data are in an advanced state of the analysis. The third observational season (2007) just completed and the data are undergoing initial checks, characterization of ground spillover and mitigation of its effects by appropriate filters in Fourier space. As processed and analyzed, these data will produce most precise measurements of the CMB polarization spectra in the multipoles range 200-2000. This will permit a detailed test of whether scalar fluctuations in the early Universe were adiabatic as predicted by the simplest inflationary models, or whether there were significant amounts of isocurvature fluctuations. QUaD also serves as a pathfinder for many of the modern observational techniques that will be needed by future experiments, probing systematic effects that must be confronted in the quest to detect the faint polarization signature from tensor modes.