The Simons Observatory: Science goals and forecasts
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Abstract
The Simons Observatory (SO) is a new cosmic microwave background experiment
being built on Cerro Toco in Chile, due to begin observations in the early
2020s. We describe the scientific goals of the experiment, motivate the design,
and forecast its performance. SO will measure the temperature and polarization
anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background in six frequency bands: 27, 39,
93, 145, 225 and 280 GHz. The initial configuration of SO will have three
small-aperture 0.5-m telescopes (SATs) and one large-aperture 6-m telescope
(LAT), with a total of 60,000 cryogenic bolometers. Our key science goals are
to characterize the primordial perturbations, measure the number of
relativistic species and the mass of neutrinos, test for deviations from a
cosmological constant, improve our understanding of galaxy evolution, and
constrain the duration of reionization. The SATs will target the largest
angular scales observable from Chile, mapping ~10% of the sky to a white noise
level of 2
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1475-7516
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Science and Technology Facilities Council (ST/P000673/1)
Science and Technology Facilities Council (ST/L000636/1)
Science and Technology Facilities Council (ST/N004019/1)
STFC (1947326)