Description:

Title: The South Pole Telescope: Searching for cosmological answers with the cosmic microwave background

Speaker: Amy Bender, KCIP; Argonne National Laboratory

Host: Deanne Coppejans

Abstract: Observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) are a cornerstone of our current cosmological model. The CMB contains the imprint of signals from both early and late times in the evolution of the universe, enabling a diverse set of fundamental probes. CMB experiments are currently focused on measuring the B-mode polarization signature, as it has the potential to constrain inflationary gravitational waves as well as the effect of massive neutrinos on structure formation. The South Pole Telescope (SPT) is a large-aperture millimeter-wavelength telescope that has observed the CMB for the past decade. In this talk, I will highlight recent results from the SPT surveys including measurements of the CMB polarization. Over the past three months, the SPT was upgraded with a new receiver. I will discuss some of the technological advances implemented in this receiver and how it will open a new regime in multiband polarized observations of the CMB.

Keywords: Physics, Astronomy, Astrophysics