Detection of polarization in the cosmic microwave background using DASI

J. M. Kovac (), E. M. Leitch, C. Pryke, J. E. Carlstrom, N. W. Halverson and W. L. Holzapfel
Additional contact information
J. M. Kovac: University of Chicago
E. M. Leitch: University of Chicago
C. Pryke: University of Chicago
J. E. Carlstrom: University of Chicago
N. W. Halverson: University of Chicago
W. L. Holzapfel: University of Chicago

Nature, 2002, vol. 420, issue 6917, 772-787

Abstract: Abstract The past several years have seen the emergence of a standard cosmological model, in which small temperature differences in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation on angular scales of the order of a degree are understood to arise from acoustic oscillations in the hot plasma of the early Universe, arising from primordial density fluctuations. Within the context of this model, recent measurements of the temperature fluctuations have led to profound conclusions about the origin, evolution and composition of the Universe. Using the measured temperature fluctuations, the theoretical framework predicts the level of polarization of the CMB with essentially no free parameters. Therefore, a measurement of the polarization is a critical test of the theory and thus of the validity of the cosmological parameters derived from the CMB measurements. Here we report the detection of polarization of the CMB with the Degree Angular Scale Interferometer (DASI). The polarization is deteced with high confidence, and its level and spatial distribution are in excellent agreement with the predictions of the standard theory.

Date: 2002
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature01269 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:420:y:2002:i:6917:d:10.1038_nature01269

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/nature01269

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().