Data reduction pipeline for the Hi-GAL survey Traficante, A.; Calzoletti, L.; Veneziani, M. ...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society,
October 2011, Letnik:
416, Številka:
4
Journal Article
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We present the data reduction pipeline for the Herschel Infrared Galactic Plane survey (Hi-GAL). Hi-GAL is a key project of the Herschel satellite, which is mapping the inner part of the Galactic ...plane (|l| ≤ 70° and |b| ≤ 1°), using two Photodetector Array Camera and Spectrometer (PACS) and three Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver (SPIRE) frequency bands, from 70 to 500 μm. Our pipeline relies only partially on the Herschel Interactive Processing Environment (hipe). It features several newly developed routines to perform data reduction, including accurate data culling, noise estimation and minimum variance map-making, the latter performed with the romagal algorithm, a deep modification of the roma code already tested on cosmological surveys. We discuss in depth the properties of the Hi-GAL science demonstration phase data.
Aims. We present an extension of the ROMA map-making algorithm for the generation of optimal cosmic microwave background polarization maps. The new code allows for a possible cross-correlated noise ...component among the detectors of a CMB experiment. A promising application is the forthcoming LSPE balloon-borne experiment, which is devoted to the accurate observation of CMB polarization at large angular scales. Methods. We generalized the noise covariance matrix in time domain to account for all the off-diagonal terms due to the detector cross-talk. Hence, we performed preliminary forecasts of the LSPE-SWIPE instrument. Results. We found that considering the noise cross-correlation among the detectors results in a more realistic estimate of the angular power spectra. In particular, the extended ROMA algorithm has provided a considerable reduction of the spectra error bars. We expect that this improvement could be crucial in constraining the B-mode polarization at the largest scales.
According to the most popular scenario, the early Universe should have experienced an accelerated expansion phase, called Cosmological Inflation, after which the standard Big Bang Cosmology would ...have taken place giving rise to the radiation-dominated epoch. However, the details of the inflationary scenario are far to be completely understood. Thus, in this paper we study if possible additional (exotic) cosmological phases could delay the beginning of the standard Big Bang history and alter some theoretical predictions related to the inflationary cosmological perturbations, like, for instance, the order of magnitude of the tensor-to-scalar ratio r.A post-publication change was made to this article on 4 Jun 2020 to correct the title on the webpage.
We present the first far infrared (FIR) dust emission polarization map covering the full extent of Milky Way’s central molecular zone (CMZ). The data, obtained with the PILOT balloon-borne ...experiment, covers the Galactic center region − 2° < ℓ < 2°, − 4° < b < 3° at a wavelength of 240 μm and an angular resolution of 2.2′. From our measured dust polarization angles, we infer a magnetic field orientation projected onto the plane of the sky (POS) that is remarkably ordered over the full extent of the CMZ, with an average tilt angle of ≃22° clockwise with respect to the Galactic plane. Our results confirm previous claims that the field traced by dust polarized emission is oriented nearly orthogonally to the field traced by GHz radio synchrotron emission in the Galactic center region. The observed field structure is globally compatible with the latest Planck polarization data at 353 and 217 GHz. Upon subtraction of the extended emission in our data, the mean field orientation that we obtain shows good agreement with the mean field orientation measured at higher angular resolution by the JCMT within the 20 and 50 km s−1 molecular clouds. We find no evidence that the magnetic field orientation is related to the 100 pc twisted ring structure within the CMZ. The low polarization fraction in the Galactic center region measured with Planck at 353 GHz combined with a highly ordered projected field orientation is unusual. This feature actually extends to the whole inner Galactic plane. We propose that it could be caused by the increased number of turbulent cells for the long lines of sight towards the inner Galactic plane or to dust properties specific to the inner regions of the Galaxy. Assuming equipartition between magnetic pressure and ram pressure, we obtain magnetic field strength estimates of the order of 1 mG for several CMZ molecular clouds.
The blackbody radiation left over from the Big Bang has been transformed by the expansion of the Universe into the nearly isotropic 2.73 K cosmic microwave background. Tiny inhomogeneities in the ...early Universe left their imprint on the microwave background in the form of small anisotropies in its temperature. These anisotropies contain information about basic cosmological parameters, particularly the total energy density and curvature of the Universe. Here we report the first images of resolved structure in the microwave background anisotropies over a significant part of the sky. Maps at four frequencies clearly distinguish the microwave background from foreground emission. We compute the angular power spectrum of the microwave background, and find a peak at Legendre multipole Ipeak = (197 +/- 6), with an amplitude delta T200 = (69 +/- 8) microK. This is consistent with that expected for cold dark matter models in a flat (euclidean) Universe, as favoured by standard inflationary models.
The physical properties of galactic cirrus emission are not well characterized. BOOMERANG is a balloon-borne experiment designed to study the cosmic microwave background at high angular resolution in ...the millimeter range. The BOOMERANG 245 and 345 GHz channels are sensitive to interstellar signals, in a spectral range intermediate between FIR and microwave frequencies. We look for physical characteristics of cirrus structures in a region at high galactic latitudes (b ~ -40°) where BOOMERANG performed its deepest integration, combining the BOOMERANG data with other available data sets at different wavelengths. We have detected eight emission patches in the 345 GHz map, consistent with cirrus dust in the Infrared Astronomical Satellite maps. The analysis technique we have developed allows us to identify the location and the shape of cirrus clouds, and to extract the flux from observations with different instruments at different wavelengths and angular resolutions. We study the integrated flux emitted from these cirrus clouds using data from Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS), DIRBE, BOOMERANG and Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe in the frequency range 23-3000 GHz (13 mm-100 μm wavelength). We fit the measured spectral energy distributions with a combination of a gray body and a power-law spectra considering two models for the thermal emission. The temperature of the thermal dust component varies in the 7-20 K range and its emissivity spectral index is in the 1-5 range. We identified a physical relation between temperature and spectral index as had been proposed in previous works. This technique can be proficiently used for the forthcoming Planck and Herschel missions data.
We report on observations of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) obtained during the 2003 January flight of BOOMERANG. These results are derived from 195 hr of observation with four 145 GHz ...polarization-sensitive bolometer (PSB) pairs, identical in design to the four 143 GHz Planck High Frequency Instrument (HFI) polarized pixels. The data include 75 hr of observations distributed over 1.84% of the sky with an additional 120 hr concentrated on the central portion of the field, which represents 0.22% of the full sky. From these data we derive an estimate of the angular power spectrum of temperature fluctuations of the CMB in 24 bands over the multipole range 50 ,l,1500. A series of features, consistent with those expected from acoustic oscillations in the primordial photon-baryon fluid, are clearly evident in the power spectrum, as is the exponential damping of power on scales smaller than the photon mean free path at the epoch of last scattering (l 900). As a consistency check, the collaboration has performed two fully independent analyses of the time-ordered data, which are found to be in excellent agreement.
Context. Cosmic microwave background (CMB) B-mode experiments are required to control systematic effects with an unprecedented level of accuracy. Polarization modulation by a half wave plate (HWP) is ...a powerful technique able to mitigate a large number of the instrumental systematics. Aims. Our goal is to optimize the polarization modulation strategy of the upcoming LSPE-SWIPE balloon-borne experiment, devoted to the accurate measurement of CMB polarization at large angular scales. Methods. We departed from the nominal LSPE-SWIPE modulation strategy (HWP stepped every 60 s with a telescope scanning at around 12 deg/s) and performed a thorough investigation of a wide range of possible HWP schemes (either in stepped or continuously spinning mode and at different azimuth telescope scan-speeds) in the frequency, map and angular power spectrum domain. In addition, we probed the effect of high-pass and band-pass filters of the data stream and explored the HWP response in the minimal case of one detector for one operation day (critical for the single-detector calibration process). We finally tested the modulation performance against typical HWP-induced systematics. Results. Our analysis shows that some stepped HWP schemes, either slowly rotating or combined with slow telescope modulations, represent poor choices. Moreover, our results point out that the nominal configuration may not be the most convenient choice. While a large class of spinning designs provides comparable results in terms of pixel angle coverage, map-making residuals and BB power spectrum standard deviations with respect to the nominal strategy, we find that some specific configurations (e.g., a rapidly spinning HWP with a slow gondola modulation) allow a more efficient polarization recovery in more general real-case situations. Conclusions. Although our simulations are specific to the LSPE-SWIPE mission, the general outcomes of our analysis can be easily generalized to other CMB polarization experiments.
We present the cosmological parameters from the CMB intensity and polarization power spectra of the 2003 Antarctic flight of the BOOMERANG telescope. The BOOMERANG data alone constrain the parameters ...of the CDM model remarkably well and are consistent with constraints from a multiexperiment combined CMB data set. We add LSS data from the 2dF and SDSS redshift surveys to the combined CMB data set and test several extensions to the standard model including running of the spectral index, curvature, tensor modes, the effect of massive neutrinos, and an effective equation of state for dark energy. We also include an analysis of constraints to a model that allows a CDM isocurvature admixture.