| A more general standard rod for cosmology |
| Ravi Sheth, University of Pennsylvania |
| Event Type: Astro Seminar |
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| Time: 2:00 PM - 3:15 PM |
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| Location: 726 Broadway, 940, CCPP Seminar |
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| Abstract: The Baryon Acoustic Oscillation feature in the galaxy distribution has proved to be a remarkable standard rod for inferring cosmological distances. The oscillations are manifest as a peak in the pairwise correlation function of a variety of tracers of the dark matter distribution at pair separations of about 150 Mpc. There is also a dip at around 130~Mpc. Although evolution and scale-dependent tracer bias slightly shift or distort both the peak and dip, the point midway between them is invariant to sub-percent precision. I will describe why, and how this offers an alternative methodology to estimating the distance scale. |