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Title: Measurements of Sub-degree B-mode Polarization in the Cosmic Microwave Background from 100 Square Degrees of SPTpol Data

Journal Article · · The Astrophysical Journal (Online)
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  1. Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Physics; Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Kavli Inst. for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology
  2. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Physics
  3. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Dept. of Physics
  4. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States). Dept. of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences
  5. Cardiff Univ. (United Kingdom). School of Physics and Astronomy
  6. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States)
  7. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States). Dept. of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences; National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Boulder, CO (United States). NIST Quantum Devices Group
  8. National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Boulder, CO (United States). NIST Quantum Devices Group
  9. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); McGill Univ., Montreal, QC (Canada). Dept of Physics; Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division
  10. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Astronomy and Astrophysics; Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
  11. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept of Physics; Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division
  12. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept of Physics; Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Astronomy and Astrophysics; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Enrico Fermi Inst.
  13. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. Astronomy and Astrophysics
  14. Univ. of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban (South Africa). School of Mathematics, Statistics & Computer Science
  15. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
  16. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics
  17. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Astronomy and Astrophysics
  18. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Astronomy and Astrophysics; California Inst. of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States)
  19. McGill Univ., Montreal, QC (Canada). Dept of Physics; Canadian Inst. for Advanced Research, Toronto, ON (Canada). CIFAR Program in Cosmology and Gravity
  20. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States). Dept. of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences
  21. McGill Univ., Montreal, QC (Canada). Dept of Physics
  22. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States). Dept. of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences; Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States). Dept. of Physics
  23. Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Physics; SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
  24. Univ. of California, Davis, CA (United States). Dept. of Physics
  25. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Dept. of Physics; Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Physics Division
  26. National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Boulder, CO (United States). NIST Quantum Devices Group; SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
  27. Univ. of Arizona, Tucson, AZ (United States). Steward Observatory
  28. Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (United States). Dept. of Physics
  29. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division
  30. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics (KICP); Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Astronomy and Astrophysics; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Dept. of Physics; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Enrico Fermi Inst.
  31. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Materials Sciences Division
  32. California Inst. of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States)
  33. Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States). School of Physics and Astronomy
  34. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Dept. of Physics; Univ. of Melbourne (Australia). School of Physics
  35. Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH (United States). Center for Education and Research in Cosmology and Astrophysics and Physics Dept.
  36. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Kavli Inst. for Cosmological Physics; Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States). Enrico Fermi Inst.; School of the Art Inst. of Chicago, Chicago, IL (United States). Liberal Arts Dept.
  37. McGill Univ., Montreal, QC (Canada). Dept of Physics; Three-Speed Logic, Inc., Vancouver, BC (Canada)
  38. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA (United States)
  39. Univ. of Toronto, ON (Canada). Dunlap Inst. for Astronomy & Astrophysics; Univ. of Toronto, ON (Canada). Dept. of Astronomy & Astrophysics
  40. Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States). Astronomy Dept.; Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States). Dept. of Physics
  41. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). High Energy Physics Division
  42. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Berkeley Center for Cosmological Physics, Dept. of Physics; Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

We present a measurement of the $$B$$-mode polarization power spectrum (the $BB$ spectrum) from 100 $$\mathrm{deg}^2$$ of sky observed with SPTpol, a polarization-sensitive receiver currently installed on the South Pole Telescope. The observations used in this work were taken during 2012 and early 2013 and include data in spectral bands centered at 95 and 150 GHz. We report the $BB$ spectrum in five bins in multipole space, spanning the range $$300 \le \ell \le 2300$$, and for three spectral combinations: 95 GHz $$\times$$ 95 GHz, 95 GHz $$\times$$ 150 GHz, and 150 GHz $$\times$$ 150 GHz. We subtract small ($$< 0.5 \sigma$$ in units of statistical uncertainty) biases from these spectra and account for the uncertainty in those biases. The resulting power spectra are inconsistent with zero power but consistent with predictions for the $BB$ spectrum arising from the gravitational lensing of $$E$$-mode polarization. If we assume no other source of $BB$ power besides lensed $$B$$ modes, we determine a preference for lensed $$B$$ modes of $$4.9 \sigma$$. After marginalizing over tensor power and foregrounds, namely polarized emission from galactic dust and extragalactic sources, this significance is $$4.3 \sigma$$. Fitting for a single parameter, $$A_\mathrm{lens}$$, that multiplies the predicted lensed $$B$$-mode spectrum, and marginalizing over tensor power and foregrounds, we find $$A_\mathrm{lens} = 1.08 \pm 0.26$$, indicating that our measured spectra are consistent with the signal expected from gravitational lensing. The data presented here provide the best measurement to date of the $$B$$-mode power spectrum on these angular scales.

Research Organization:
Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP); National Science Foundation (NSF); Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation; Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC); Canadian Institute for Advanced Research
Contributing Organization:
SPT
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-07CH11359; AC02-06CH11357; AC02-05CH11231; PLR-1248097; PHY-0114422; GBMF#947; AST-1402161
OSTI ID:
1390209
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1390207
Report Number(s):
arXiv:1503.02315; FERMILAB-PUB-15-672-AE; 1351177
Journal Information:
The Astrophysical Journal (Online), Vol. 807, Issue 2; ISSN 1538-4357
Publisher:
Institute of Physics (IOP)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 118 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background Polarization Lensing Power Spectrum with the POLARBEAR Experiment journal July 2014
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Measurements of E-Mode Polarization and Temperature-E-Mode Correlation in the Cosmic Microwave Background from 100 Square Degrees of SPTpol Data text January 2014
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Cited By (51)

The Polarbear-2 and the Simons Array Experiments journal January 2016
Low-Temperature Detectors for CMB Imaging Arrays journal August 2018
On-Sky Performance of the SPT-3G Frequency-Domain Multiplexed Readout journal December 2019
Testing general relativity in cosmology journal December 2018
Iterative map-making with two-level preconditioning for polarized cosmic microwave background data sets: A worked example for ground-based experiments journal October 2018
Dark matter and dark energy interactions: theoretical challenges, cosmological implications and observational signatures journal August 2016
Searching for primordial magnetic fields with CMB B -modes journal May 2018
Recent discoveries from the cosmic microwave background: a review of recent progress journal February 2018
Stochastic gravitational wave backgrounds journal November 2018
Clustering fossil from primordial gravitational waves in anisotropic inflation journal October 2015
Robust forecasts on fundamental physics from the foreground-obscured, gravitationally-lensed CMB polarization journal March 2016
CMB-lensing beyond the Born approximation journal September 2016
The Atacama Cosmology Telescope: two-season ACTPol spectra and parameters journal June 2017
Exploring cosmic origins with CORE: Survey requirements and mission design journal April 2018
Dark energy, α-attractors, and large-scale structure surveys journal June 2018
CMB lensing reconstruction biases in cross-correlation with large-scale structure probes journal October 2019
CMB lensing tomography with the DES Science Verification galaxies journal January 2016
Impact of modelling foreground uncertainties on future CMB polarization satellite experiments journal April 2017
ABS: an analytical method of blind separation of CMB from foregrounds journal January 2019
Fractional polarization of extragalactic sources in the 500 deg2 SPTpol survey journal October 2019
Rotation of the CMB polarization by foreground lensing journal August 2019
Constraining power of cosmological observables: Blind redshift spots and optimal ranges journal March 2019
Design and development of an ambient-temperature continuously-rotating achromatic half-wave plate for CMB polarization modulation on the POLARBEAR-2 experiment conference July 2016
Year two instrument status of the SPT-3G cosmic microwave background receiver
  • Carter, Faustin W.; Cecil, Thomas W.; Chang, Clarence L.
  • Millimeter, Submillimeter, and Far-Infrared Detectors and Instrumentation for Astronomy IX https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2312426
conference August 2018
CMB Polarization B -mode Delensing with SPTpol and Herschel journal August 2017
Current and Future Constraints on Primordial Magnetic Fields journal September 2017
A Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background B -mode Polarization Power Spectrum at Subdegree Scales from Two Years of polarbear Data journal October 2017
Measurements of the Temperature and E-mode Polarization of the CMB from 500 Square Degrees of SPTpol Data journal January 2018
Forecasting the Contribution of Polarized Extragalactic Radio Sources in CMB Observations journal May 2018
BICEP2/Keck Array XI: Beam Characterization and Temperature-to-Polarization Leakage in the BK15 Data Set journal October 2019
A Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background Lensing Potential and Power Spectrum from 500 deg 2 of SPTpol Temperature and Polarization Data journal October 2019
Testing the ABS Method with the Simulated Planck Temperature Maps journal December 2018
CMB lensing tomography with the DES Science Verification galaxies text January 2015
Towards a cosmological neutrino mass detection text January 2015
Gravitational-wave cosmology across 29 decades in frequency text January 2015
Dark Matter and Dark Energy Interactions: Theoretical Challenges, Cosmological Implications and Observational Signatures text January 2016
CMB-lensing beyond the Born approximation text January 2016
Design and development of an ambient-temperature continuously-rotating achromatic half-wave plate for CMB polarization modulation on the POLARBEAR-2 experiment text January 2016
Simulated forecasts for primordial B-mode searches in ground-based experiments text January 2016
The Observational Future of Cosmological Scalar-Tensor Theories text January 2016
CMB Lens Sample Covariance and Consistency Relations text January 2016
CMB Polarization B-mode Delensing with SPTpol and Herschel text January 2017
Current and Future Constraints on Primordial Magnetic Fields text January 2017
Measurements of the Temperature and E-Mode Polarization of the CMB from 500 Square Degrees of SPTpol Data text January 2017
Lens covariance effects on likelihood analyses of CMB power spectra text January 2017
Tensions between direct measurements of the lens power spectrum from Planck data text January 2018
Testing the ABS method with the simulated Planck temperature maps text January 2018
Constraining power of cosmological observables: blind redshift spots and optimal ranges text January 2018
Future CMB constraints on cosmic birefringence and implications for fundamental physics text January 2019
A Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background Lensing Potential and Power Spectrum from 500 deg$^2$ of SPTpol Temperature and Polarization Data text January 2019
On-sky performance of the SPT-3G frequency-domain multiplexed readout text January 2019

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Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
cosmic background radiation
cosmology observations