Using BBN in cosmological parameter extraction from CMB: a forecast for Planck

Data from future high-precision Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) measurements will be sensitive to the primordial Helium abundance $Y_p$. At the same time, this parameter can be predicted from Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) as a function of the baryon and radiation densities, as well as a neutrino chemical potential. We suggest to use this information to impose a self-consistent BBN prior on $Y_p$ and determine its impact on parameter inference from simulated Planck data. We find that this approach can significantly improve bounds on cosmological parameters compared to an analysis which treats $Y_p$ as a free parameter, if the neutrino chemical potential is taken to vanish. We demonstrate that fixing the Helium fraction to an arbitrary value can seriously bias parameter estimates. Under the assumption of degenerate BBN (i.e., letting the neutrino chemical potential $\xi$ vary), the BBN prior's constraining power is somewhat weakened, but nevertheless allows us to constrain $\xi$ with an accuracy that rivals bounds inferred from present data on light element abundances.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures; v2: minor changes, matches published versio

Detection of the tSZ effect with the NIKA camera

We present the first detection of the thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (tSZ) effect from a cluster of galaxies performed with a KIDs (Kinetic Inductance Detectors) based instrument. The tSZ effect is a distortion of the black body CMB (Cosmic Microwave Background) spectrum produced by the inverse Compton interaction of CMB photons with the hot electrons of the ionized intra-cluster medium. The massive, intermediate redshift cluster RX J1347.5-1145 has been observed using NIKA (New IRAM KIDs arrays), a dual-band (140 and 240 GHz) mm-wave imaging camera, which exploits two arrays of hundreds of KIDs: the resonant frequencies of the superconducting resonators are shifted by mm-wave photons absorption. This tSZ cluster observation demonstrates the potential of the next generation NIKA2 instrument, being developed for the 30m telescope of IRAM, at Pico Veleta (Spain). NIKA2 will have 1000 detectors at 140GHz and 2x2000 detectors at 240GHz, providing in that band also a measurement of the linear polarization. NIKA2 will be commissioned in 2015.Comment: SF2A Proceedings 201

NIKA2: a mm camera for cluster cosmology

Galaxy clusters constitute a major cosmological probe. However, Planck 2015 results have shown a weak tension between CMB-derived and cluster-derived cosmological parameters. This tension might be due to poor knowledge of the cluster mass and observable relationship. As for now, arcmin resolution Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) observations ({\it e.g.} SPT, ACT and Planck) only allowed detailed studies of the intra cluster medium for low redshift clusters ($z0.5$) high resolution and high sensitivity SZ observations are needed. With both a wide field of view (6.5 arcmin) and a high angular resolution (17.7 and 11.2 arcsec at 150 and 260 GHz), the NIKA2 camera installed at the IRAM 30-m telescope (Pico Veleta, Spain) is particularly well adapted for these observations. The NIKA2 SZ observation program will map a large sample of clusters (50) at redshifts between 0.5 and 0.9. As a pilot study for NIKA2, several clusters of galaxies have been observed with the pathfinder, NIKA, at the IRAM 30-m telescope to cover the various configurations and observation conditions expected for NIKA2.

Non-parametric deprojection of NIKA SZ observations: Pressure distribution in the Planck-discovered cluster PSZ1 G045.85+57.71

The determination of the thermodynamic properties of clusters of galaxies at intermediate and high redshift can bring new insights into the formation of large-scale structures. It is essential for a robust calibration of the mass-observable scaling relations and their scatter, which are key ingredients for precise cosmology using cluster statistics. Here we illustrate an application of high resolution $(< 20$ arcsec) thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (tSZ) observations by probing the intracluster medium (ICM) of the \planck-discovered galaxy cluster \psz\ at redshift $z = 0.61$, using tSZ data obtained with the NIKA camera, which is a dual-band (150 and 260~GHz) instrument operated at the IRAM 30-meter telescope. We deproject jointly NIKA and \planck\ data to extract the electronic pressure distribution from the cluster core ($R \sim 0.02\, R_{500}$) to its outskirts ($R \sim 3\, R_{500}$) non-parametrically for the first time at intermediate redshift. The constraints on the resulting pressure profile allow us to reduce the relative uncertainty on the integrated Compton parameter by a factor of two compared to the \planck\ value. Combining the tSZ data and the deprojected electronic density profile from \xmm\ allows us to undertake a hydrostatic mass analysis, for which we study the impact of a spherical model assumption on the total mass estimate. We also investigate the radial temperature and entropy distributions. These data indicate that \psz\ is a massive ($M_{500} \sim 5.5 \times 10^{14}$ M$_{\odot}$) cool-core cluster. This work is part of a pilot study aiming at optimizing the treatment of the NIKA2 tSZ large program dedicated to the follow-up of SZ-discovered clusters at intermediate and high redshifts. (abridged)Comment: 16 pages, 10 figure

High angular resolution Sunyaev-Zel'dovich observations of MACS J1423.8+2404 with NIKA: Multiwavelength analysis

The prototype of the NIKA2 camera, NIKA, is an instrument operating at the IRAM 30-m telescope, which can observe simultaneously at 150 and 260GHz. One of the main goals of NIKA2 is to measure the pressure distribution in galaxy clusters at high resolution using the thermal SZ (tSZ) effect. Such observations have already proved to be an excellent probe of cluster pressure distributions even at high redshifts. However, an important fraction of clusters host submm and/or radio point sources, which can significantly affect the reconstructed signal. Here we report on <20" resolution observations at 150 and 260GHz of the cluster MACSJ1424, which hosts both radio and submm point sources. We examine the morphology of the tSZ signal and compare it to other datasets. The NIKA data are combined with Herschel satellite data to study the SED of the submm point source contaminants. We then perform a joint reconstruction of the intracluster medium (ICM) electronic pressure and density by combining NIKA, Planck, XMM-Newton, and Chandra data, focusing on the impact of the radio and submm sources on the reconstructed pressure profile. We find that large-scale pressure distribution is unaffected by the point sources because of the resolved nature of the NIKA observations. The reconstructed pressure in the inner region is slightly higher when the contribution of point sources are removed. We show that it is not possible to set strong constraints on the central pressure distribution without accurately removing these contaminants. The comparison with X-ray only data shows good agreement for the pressure, temperature, and entropy profiles, which all indicate that MACSJ1424 is a dynamically relaxed cool core system. The present observations illustrate the possibility of measuring these quantities with a relatively small integration time, even at high redshift and without X-ray spectroscopy.Comment: 15 pages, 17 figures, submitted to A&

Nika2: A mm camera for cluster cosmology

Galaxy clusters constitute a major cosmological probe. However, Planck 2015 results have shown a weak tension between CMB-derived and cluster-derived cosmological parameters. This tension might be due to poor knowledge of the cluster mass and observable relationship. As for now, arcmin resolution Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) observations (e.g. SPT, ACT and Planck) only allowed detailed studies of the intra cluster medium for low redshift clusters (z 0:5) high resolution and high sensitivity SZ observations are needed. With both a wide field of view (6.5 arcmin) and a high angular resolution (17.7 and 11.2 arcsec at 150 and 260 GHz), the NIKA2 camera installed at the IRAM 30-m telescope (Pico Veleta, Spain) is particularly well adapted for these observations. The NIKA2 SZ observation program will map a large sample of clusters (50) at redshifts between 0.5 and 0.9. As a pilot study for NIKA2, several clusters of galaxies have been observed with the pathfinder, NIKA, at the IRAM 30-m telescope to cover the various configurations and observation conditions expected for NIKA2

The NIKA2 instrument, a dual-band kilopixel KID array for millimetric astronomy

NIKA2 (New IRAM KID Array 2) is a camera dedicated to millimeter wave astronomy based upon kilopixel arrays of Kinetic Inductance Detectors (KID). The pathfinder instrument, NIKA, has already shown state-of-the-art detector performance. NIKA2 builds upon this experience but goes one step further, increasing the total pixel count by a factor $\sim$10 while maintaining the same per pixel performance. For the next decade, this camera will be the resident photometric instrument of the Institut de Radio Astronomie Millimetrique (IRAM) 30m telescope in Sierra Nevada (Spain). In this paper we give an overview of the main components of NIKA2, and describe the achieved detector performance. The camera has been permanently installed at the IRAM 30m telescope in October 2015. It will be made accessible to the scientific community at the end of 2016, after a one-year commissioning period. When this happens, NIKA2 will become a fundamental tool for astronomers worldwide.Comment: Proceedings of the 16th Low Temperature Detectors workshop. To be published in the Journal of Low Temperature Physics. 8 pages, 4 figures, 1 tabl

High-resolution tSZ cartography of clusters of galaxies with NIKA at the IRAM 30-m telescope

The thermal Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect (tSZ) is a powerful probe to study clusters of galaxies and is complementary with respect to X-ray, lensing or optical observations. Previous arcmin resolution tSZ observations ({\it e.g.} SPT, ACT and Planck) only enabled detailed studies of the intra-cluster medium morphology for low redshift clusters ($z < 0.2$). Thus, the development of precision cosmology with clusters requires high angular resolution observations to extend the understanding of galaxy cluster towards high redshift. NIKA2 is a wide-field (6.5 arcmin field of view) dual-band camera, operated at $100 \ {\rm mK}$ and containing $\sim 3300$ KID (Kinetic Inductance Detectors), designed to observe the millimeter sky at 150 and 260 GHz, with an angular resolution of 18 and 12 arcsec respectively. The NIKA2 camera has been installed on the IRAM 30-m telescope (Pico Veleta, Spain) in September 2015. The NIKA2 tSZ observation program will allow us to observe a large sample of clusters (50) at redshift ranging between 0.5 and 1. As a pathfinder for NIKA2, several clusters of galaxies have been observed at the IRAM 30-m telescope with the NIKA prototype to cover the various configurations and observation conditions expected for NIKA2.Comment: Proceedings of the 28th Texas Symposium on Relativistic Astrophysics, Geneva, Switzerland, December 13-18, 201

Axions and saxions from the primordial supersymmetric plasma and extra radiation signatures

We calculate the rate for thermal production of axions and saxions via scattering of quarks, gluons, squarks, and gluinos in the primordial supersymmetric plasma. Systematic field theoretical methods such as hard thermal loop resummation are applied to obtain a finite result in a gauge-invariant way that is consistent to leading order in the strong gauge coupling. We calculate the thermally produced yield and the decoupling temperature for both axions and saxions. For the generic case in which saxion decays into axions are possible, the emitted axions can constitute extra radiation already prior to big bang nucleosynthesis and well thereafter. We update associated limits imposed by recent studies of the primordial helium-4 abundance and by precision cosmology of the cosmic microwave background and large scale structure. We show that the trend towards extra radiation seen in those studies can be explained by late decays of thermal saxions into axions and that upcoming Planck results will probe supersymmetric axion models with unprecedented sensitivity.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures; v2: references added, minor clarifying additions, matches published versio

WMAP 5-year constraints on lepton asymmetry and radiation energy density: Implications for Planck

In this paper we set bounds on the radiation content of the Universe and neutrino properties by using the WMAP-5 year CMB measurements complemented with most of the existing CMB and LSS data (WMAP5+All),imposing also self-consistent BBN constraints on the primordial helium abundance. We consider lepton asymmetric cosmological models parametrized by the neutrino degeneracy parameter and the variation of the relativistic degrees of freedom, due to possible other physical processes occurred between BBN and structure formation epochs. We find that WMAP5+All data provides strong bounds on helium mass fraction and neutrino degeneracy parameter that rivals the similar bounds obtained from the conservative analysis of the present data on helium abundance. We also find a strong correlation between the matter energy density and the redshift of matter-radiation equality, z_re, showing that we observe non-zero equivalent number of relativistic neutrinos mainly via the change of the of z_re, rather than via neutrino anisotropic stress claimed by the WMAP team. We forecast that the CMB temperature and polarization measurements observed with high angular resolutions and sensitivities by the future Planck satellite will reduce the errors on these parameters down to values fully consistent with the BBN bounds