ACTPol: a polarization-sensitive receiverfor the Atacama Cosmology Telescope

Jun, 2010

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Abstract: (International Society for Optics and Photonics)
The six-meter Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) in Chile was built to measure the cosmic microwave background(CMB) at arcminute angular scales. We are building a new polarization sensitive receiver for ACT(ACTPol). ACTPol will characterize the gravitational lensing of the CMB and aims to constrain the sum of theneutrino masses with ~ 0.05 eV precision, the running of the spectral index of inflation-induced fluctuations,and the primordial helium abundance to better than 1 %. Our observing fields will overlap with the SDSS BOSSsurvey at optical wavelengths, enabling a variety of cross-correlation science, including studies of the growth ofcosmic structure from Sunyaev-Zel'dovich observations of clusters of galaxies as well as independent constraintson the sum of the neutrino masses. We describe the science objectives and the initial receiver design.
  • B-modes
  • Cosmic Microwave Background
  • Cryogenics
  • Gravitational Lensing
  • Neutrino Mass
  • Optical Design
  • Polarization
  • Transition-Edge-Sensor Detector Arrays