WMAP peers back to the early universe
FEB 03, 2010
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.024056
Wired.com : New papers based on the first seven years of data taken by NASA’s Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) have been posted to arXiv (see list below).The data have helped researchers calculate the most accurate determination yet of the age of the cosmos. Moreover, WMAP directly detected primordial helium gas for the first time, and has discovered a key signature of inflation, the leading cosmological model of how the universe developed from its earliest beginnings.The data also provide new evidence that the mysterious entity speeding up the expansion of the universe resembles Einstein’s cosmological constant, a factor he inserted but later removed from his theory of general relativity.In addition, the data reveal that theorists don’t have the right model to explain the hot gas that surrounds massive clusters of galaxies. Related links1. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Are There Cosmic Microwave Background Anomalies? 2. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Sky Maps, Systematic Errors, and Basic Results 3. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Planets and Celestial Calibration Sources 4. Variograms of the Cosmic Microwave Background Temperature Fluctuations: Confirmation of Deviations from Statistical Isotropy 5. Inconsistency between WMAP data and released map 6. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Power Spectra and WMAP-Derived Parameters 7. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Galactic Foreground Emission 8. Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Cosmological Interpretation
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