Probing Physics of Inflation and Neutrino properties with CMB measurements from the BICEP/Keck Array and South Pole Telescope
by
51/3-305 - Kavli 3rd Floor
SLAC
The early cosmic acceleration of the universe -- generically predicts a background of primordial gravitational waves, which generate a primordial B-mode component in the polarization of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The measurement of such a B-mode signature would lend significant support to the paradigm of inflation. Observed B modes also contain a component from the gravitational lensing of primordial E modes, which can obscure the measurement of the primordial B modes. We reduce the uncertainties in the B-mode spectrum measurement contributed from this lensing component by a technique called 'delensing.’ In this talk, I will give an update on the current delensing effort on the BICEP/Keck data, using data also from the South Pole Telescope (SPT) and the Planck satellite. This analysis will reduce the uncertainty on the constraint of the primordial gravitational waves, parameterized through the tensor-to-scalar ratio r that is related to the energy scale of inflation. With the new camera on SPT, high signal-to-noise CMB lensing map will be available both for improved delensing and constraining the sum of neutrino masses, amongst other extensions to the standard cosmological model LCDM. Looking forward, I will provide an outlook of constraining r and sum of neutrino masses from BICEP Array and SPT-3G, and next-generation ground-based CMB experiment CMB-S4.