The Cosmic Microwave Background Quadrupole in a Polarized Light
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Dore, Olivier
Holder, Gilbert P.
Loeb, Abraham
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https://doi.org/10.1086/422496Metadata
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Dore, Olivier, Gilbert P. Holder, and Abraham Loeb. 2004. “The Cosmic Microwave Background Quadrupole in a Polarized Light.” The Astrophysical Journal 612 (1): 81–85. https://doi.org/10.1086/422496.Abstract
The low quadrupole of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), measured by the Cosmic Background Explorer ( COBE) and confirmed by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), has generated much discussion recently. We point out that the well-known correlation between temperature and polarization anisotropies of the CMB further constrains the low-multipole anisotropy data. This correlation originates from the fact that the low-multipole polarization signal is sourced by the CMB quadrupole as seen by free electrons during the relatively recent cosmic history. Consequently, the large-angle temperature anisotropy data make restrictive predictions for the large-angle polarization anisotropy, which depend primarily on the optical depth for electron scattering after cosmological recombination, tau. We show that if current cosmological models for the generation of large-angle anisotropy are correct and the COBE/WMAP data are not significantly contaminated by non-CMB signals, then the observed C-l(TE) amplitude on the largest scales is discrepant at the similar to99.8% level with the observed C-l(TT) for the concordant LambdaCDM model with tau 0.10. Using tau = 0.17, the preferred WMAP model-independent value, the discrepancy is at the level of 98.5%.Terms of Use
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