Detection of gravitational lensing in the cosmic microwave background

Journal Article · Wed Aug 15 04:00:00 EDT 2007 · Physical Review. D, Particles Fields

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVD.76.043510· OSTI ID:21027575

Smith, Kendrick M; Zahn, Oliver; Dore, Olivier ^[1]

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1. Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637 (United States)

Gravitational lensing of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), a long-standing prediction of the standard cosmological model, is ultimately expected to be an important source of cosmological information, but first detection has not been achieved to date. We report a 3.4{sigma} detection, by applying quadratic estimator techniques to all sky maps from the Wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe (WMAP) satellite, and correlating the result with radio galaxy counts from the NRAO VLA sky survey (NVSS). We present our methodology including a detailed discussion of potential contaminants. Our error estimates include systematic uncertainties from density gradients in NVSS, beam effects in WMAP, galactic microwave foregrounds, resolved and unresolved CMB point sources, and the thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect.

• OSTI ID: 21027575
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Journal Name: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 76; ISSN PRVDAQ; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
ANISOTROPY
COSMIC RADIATION
COSMOLOGICAL MODELS
COSMOLOGY
DENSITY
DETECTION
GRAVITATIONAL LENSES
GRAVITATIONAL WAVES
POINT SOURCES
POTENTIALS
RADIO GALAXIES
RADIOWAVE RADIATION
RELICT RADIATION