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arXiv 1908.05303astro-ph.CO
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偏振前景对全球21~cm信号的污染

On the contamination of the global 21~cm signal from polarized foregrounds

Marta Spinelli, Gianni Bernardi, Mario G. Santos

摘要:

全球(即天空平均)$21$ ~cm信号实验可以测量从宇宙黎明到再电离时代的宇宙演化。这些测量受到明亮前景发射的挑战,如果其光谱平滑,则可以从宇宙学信号中分离出来。这种假设在单极化天线的情况下失败了,因为它们测量线性极化的前景发射-这是不可避免的法拉第旋转通过星际介质。我们研究了银河系极化前景对提取全球21 cm信号的影响,通过真实的天空和偶极子模拟,在低频段从$50$到$100$ ~MHz,其中21 cm的吸收轮廓是预期的,并在更高的频段($100-200$ ~MHz)。我们发现,具有复杂频率结构的极化污染物的存在下,可以偏置的幅度和形状的重建信号参数在两个频带。我们调查,如果极化前景可以解释意想不到的$21$ ~cm宇宙黎明信号最近报道的EDGES合作。我们发现,未考虑的偏振前景污染可以产生增强和扭曲的$21$ ~cm吸收谷,类似于Bowman等人(2018)报告的异常轮廓,其幅度与假设的输入高斯轮廓(在$\sim 1.5 σ$水平)处于轻度紧张状态。此外,我们注意到,在来自偏振前景的污染的假设下,重建的EDGES信号的幅度可以被高估大约$30\%$,减轻了基于奇异物理的解释的要求。

英文摘要:

Global (i.e. sky-averaged) $21$~cm signal experiments can measure the evolution of the universe from the Cosmic Dawn to the Epoch of Reionization. These measurements are challenged by the presence of bright foreground emission that can be separated from the cosmological signal if its spectrum is smooth. This assumption fails in the case of single polarization antennas as they measure linearly polarized foreground emission - which is inevitably Faraday rotated through the interstellar medium. We investigate the impact of Galactic polarized foregrounds on the extraction of the global 21~cm signal through realistic sky and dipole simulations both in a low frequency band from $50$ to $100$~MHz, where a 21~cm absorption profile is expected, and in a higher frequency band ($100-200$~MHz). We find that the presence of a polarized contaminant with complex frequency structure can bias the amplitude and the shape of the reconstructed signal parameters in both bands. We investigate if polarized foregrounds can explain the unexpected $21$~cm Cosmic Dawn signal recently reported by the EDGES collaboration. We find that unaccounted polarized foreground contamination can produce an enhanced and distorted $21$~cm absorption trough similar to the anomalous profile reported by Bowman et al. (2018), and whose amplitude is in mild tension with the assumed input Gaussian profile (at $\sim 1.5 σ$ level). Moreover, we note that, under the hypothesis of contamination from polarized foreground, the amplitude of the reconstructed EDGES signal can be overestimated by around $30\%$, mitigating the requirement for an explanation based on exotic physics.

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