The COSMOS Consortium: Fundamental Cosmology, Dark Energy and the Cosmic Microwave Sky

COSMOS，国家宇宙学超级计算机，是英国研究早期宇宙和宇宙微波背景(CMB)的主要计算平台，CMB是热大爆炸遗留下来的遗迹辐射。该提案的一个主要目的是科学地利用科学技术研究中心支持的主要实验方案提供的新观测数据。COSMOS联盟包括来自10所英国大学和伦敦学院的世界领先的这些领域的研究人员。该提案要求提供资金，用于2007-12年期间的分阶段升级和运行费用。在此期间，COSMOS联盟试图推动四个重要科学领域的全球议程：a.宇宙微波天空：开发从CMB提取关于我们宇宙的信息的数值技术。这项工作的一个特别重点是支持英国对世界上最雄心勃勃的CMB实验--欧空局普朗克卫星--的科学利用做出贡献。最大的两个普朗克分析中心位于英国，普朗克核心团队中有几个宇宙联合分析中心。联盟成员还将利用COSMOS对CMB的其他实验进行科学利用，如QUIET、EBEX、POLARBEAR和WMAP数据。这些结果将更精确地确定宇宙学参数，如定义宇宙膨胀速度的哈勃常数。我们还将使用CMB数据来描述和测试星系形成和其他大规模结构的早期宇宙理论。宇宙超级计算机是将我们对早期宇宙的数学模型转化为定量预测的必要工具，我们可以将其与这些不断改进的观测结果进行比较。特别是，我们将寻找由膨胀模型(即早期宇宙中的一段快速加速期)和高能宇宙弦所产生的具体特征。B.暗能量和大尺度结构：我们将研究和数值模拟我们宇宙中的星系团和氢气云是如何用来描述宇宙中的物质含量的。特别是，我们将研究暗能量的性质，这种能量被认为是导致我们的宇宙今天加速膨胀的原因。宇宙超级计算机的工作将直接支持暗能量调查的准备工作，暗能量调查是一项大型国际合作，STFC是其中的积极参与者。它建立在正在进行的使用宇宙超级计算机分析斯隆数字天空调查数据的成功工作的基础上，斯隆数字天空调查是一个包含100万个星系的目录，特别是重子振荡的详细特征。基础宇宙学和早期宇宙：一个关键目标将是研究我们的宇宙是如何从基本理论中产生的，这些理论统一了所有自然力，称为超弦理论或M理论，涉及额外的空间维度。我们将研究流行的模型，在这些模型中，膨胀和大爆炸是由两个膜的碰撞(所谓的膜膨胀)产生的，看看是否有可测试的信号，可能揭示额外维度的存在。许多这些模型产生宇宙弦，我们将模拟早期宇宙中可以形成弦的膜碰撞和相变，以及这些网络随后的演化。我们将在非常早期的宇宙中进一步发展我们对量子场论的量化理解，这是膨胀理论的基础。D.核物理和跨学科应用：COSMOS联盟包括研究局域和稳定的非线性场论解决方案(称为孤子)的专家。它们在整个物理学中无处不在，我们将在许多领域对它们进行研究，看看我们是否可以在实验室中测试宇宙学概念。特别是，我们将使用称为Skyrmions的孤子解来研究核物理的各个方面(现在在STFC的范围内)。

COSMOS, the National Cosmology Supercomputer, is the primary computational platform in the UK for the study of the early universe and the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the relic radiation left over from the Hot Big Bang. A key aim of the proposal is the scientific exploitation of new observational data coming from major experimental programmes supported by STFC. The COSMOS consortium encompasses world-leading researchers in these fields from ten UK Universities and London Colleges. This proposal requests funds for a phased upgrade and running costs during 2007-12. During this period, the COSMOS consortium seeks to drive the worldwide agenda in four important scientific areas: A. The cosmic microwave sky: Developing numerical techniques to extract information about our Universe from the CMB. A particular focus of this work is supporting the UK contribution to science exploitation of the world's most ambitious CMB experiment, the ESA Planck satellite. Two of the largest Planck Analysis Centres are located in the UK and several COSMOS Co-Is are on the Planck Core Team. Consortium members will also use COSMOS for science exploitation of other CMB experiments, such as QUIET, EBEX, PolarBEAR and WMAP data. These results will more precisely determine cosmological parameters like Hubble's constant which defines how fast the Universe is expanding. We will also use this CMB data to characterize and test early universe theories for the formation of galaxies and other large-scale structure. The COSMOS supercomputer is an essential tool for turning our mathematical models of the early universe into quantitative predictions which we can compare with these improving observations. In particular we will be looking for the specific signatures created by models of inflation (i.e. a period of rapid acceleration in the early universe) and also high energy cosmic strings. B. Dark energy and large-scale structure: We will investigate and numerically model how galaxy clusters and clouds of hydrogen gas in our Universe can be used to characterise the matter content of the universe. In particular we will study the nature of the dark energy believed to be causing the expansion of our Universe to accelerate today. Work on the COSMOS supercomputer will directly support preparations for the Dark Energy Survey, a large international collaboration in which STFC is an active participant. It builds on ongoing successful work using the COSMOS supercomputer to analyse data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, a catalogue of a million galaxies, in particular the detailed characterisation of baryon oscillations. C, Fundamental cosmology and the early universe: A key aim will be investigating how our Universe emerged out of fundamental theories unifying all the forces of nature, called superstring or M theory, and which involve additional space dimensions. We will study popular models in which inflation and the Big Bang arise from the collision of two branes (so-called brane inflation) to see if there are testable signatures which might reveal the presence of extra dimensions. Many of these models produce cosmic strings and we will model brane collisions and phase transitions in the early universe in which strings can form, as well as the subsequent evolution of these networks. We will develop further our quantitative understanding of quantum field theory in the very early universe, which is the foundation for inflationary theories. D. Nuclear physics amd interdisciplinary applications: The COSMOS consortium contains experts in the study of localized and stable nonlinear field theory solutions known as solitons. These are ubiquitous throughout physics and we will study them in number of areas to see if we can test cosmological concepts in the laboratory. In particular, we will study aspects of nuclear physics (now in the remit of STFC) using soliton solutions called Skyrmions.