SPIDER: CMB polarimetry from the edge of space
Abstract
SPIDER is a balloon-borne instrument designed to map the polarization of the millimeter-wave sky at large angular scales. SPIDER targets the B-mode signature of primordial gravitational waves in the cosmic microwave background (CMB), with a focus on mapping a large sky area with high fidelity at multiple frequencies. SPIDER's first longduration balloon (LDB) flight in January 2015 deployed a total of 2400 antenna-coupled Transition Edge Sensors (TESs) at 90 GHz and 150 GHz. In this work we review the design and in-flight performance of the SPIDER instrument, with a particular focus on the measured performance of the detectors and instrument in a space-like loading and radiation environment. SPIDER's second flight in December 2018 will incorporate payload upgrades and new receivers to map the sky at 285 GHz, providing valuable information for cleaning polarized dust emission from CMB maps.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1711.10596,
title = {SPIDER: CMB polarimetry from the edge of space},
author = {R. Gualtieri and J. P. Filippini and P. A. R. Ade and M. Amiri and S. J. Benton and A. S. Bergman and R. Bihary and J. J. Bock and J. R. Bond and S. A. Bryan and H. C. Chiang and C. R. Contaldi and O. Doré and A. J. Duivenvoorden and H. K. Eriksen and M. Farhang and L. M. Fissel and A. A. Fraisse and K. Freese and M. Galloway and A. E. Gambrel and N. N. Gandilo and K. Ganga and R. V. Gramillano and J. E. Gudmundsson and M. Halpern and J. Hartley and M. Hasselfield and G. Hilton and W. Holmes and V. V. Hristov and Z. Huang and K. D. Irwin and W. C. Jones and C. L. Kuo and Z. D. Kermish and S. Li and P. V. Mason and K. Megerian and L. Moncelsi and T. A. Morford and J. M. Nagy and C. B. Netterfield and M. Nolta and B. Osherson and I. L. Padilla and B. Racine and A. S. Rahlin and C. Reintsema and J. E. Ruhl and M. C. Runyan and T. M. Ruud and J. A. Shariff and J. D. Soler and X. Song and A. Trangsrud and C. Tucker and R. S. Tucker and A. D. Turner and J. F. van der List and A. C. Weber and I. K. Wehus and D. V. Wiebe and E. Y. Young},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1711.10596},
year = {2018}
}
Comments
10 pages, 7 figures, LTD17 Conference