Speaker
Prof.
Edward Wright
(UCLA)
Description
The Cosmic Microwave Background has been our most profilic source of precision cosmology data. The monopole spectrum of the CMB is the dominant radiation field at 1 mm at 1 AU from the Sun. The anisotropy of the CMB is 10,000 times smaller, but still easily measurable over the galactic foreground. But the polarization anisotropy of the CMB is another order of magnitude smaller, and the B-mode polarization is one or more orders of magnitude smaller still. Controlling the dust foreground to this level will be very challenging. At shorter wavelengths the Cosmic Infrared Background contains the integrated luminous history of the Universe, but controlling the solar system dust foreground is another challenge.
