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

该拨款提案旨在促进对天体物理盘的理解，引力波的分析，以及CMB和星系调查的科学利用，以打开宇宙结构的新窗口。以下是我们建议的项目摘要：1.在年轻恒星（行星形成的地方）和星系中心的黑洞周围发现了气体盘。这个项目将研究圆盘的行为和外观，其中轨道运动是椭圆形的或不对齐的，导致气体被反复挤压。行星是由气体和尘埃围绕新生的年轻恒星旋转而形成的，这是一个复杂的多方面过程，人们对这个过程仍然知之甚少。这个项目研究湍流、磁场和喷流如何影响这些圆盘内部区域的行星形成。宇宙中的许多物体都吸积了围绕它们运行的气体。该项目将研究气体必须通过所谓的边界层时，诸如白色矮星、年轻恒星和行星等具有物质表面的物体上的吸积现象，而对边界层的理解仍然很差。2015年LIGO对引力波的探测为探索宇宙开辟了前所未有的机遇。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，我们将为来自宇宙微波天空（西蒙斯天文台（SO））的新数据以及星系调查（暗能量调查（DES））实施扩展版本，同时还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临界检验。宇宙学观测为我们提供了一个独特的机会，在大爆炸的第一个瞬间探索高能物理和引力的量子机制。突破性的理解宇宙学中的物理学基本原理的后果，最近导致了新的令人兴奋的预测非高斯统计，我们在这里面对大型宇宙数据集，特别是从宇宙微波天空（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，对宇宙微波背景辐射的透镜效应进行新的测量，即大爆炸遗留光的引力偏转。通过我们提取和反演透镜偏转的新方法，我们将提供宇宙起源和中微子粒子未知质量的更清晰视图。

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.