Map My Universe
BMW of telescopes gets into action
The European Space Agency launched an instrument called the Planck telescope into outer space from the Guiana Space Centre in May 2010.
Planck was an international effort that also involved NASA, the Canadian Space Agency and several CIFAR Cosmology and Gravity program members. The telescope will use cutting edge technology to take new measurements of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), the radiation emitted right after the Big Bang.
Planck trumps its predecessors WMAP and COBE in all aspects of measuring technology with both a Low Frequency Instrument (LFI) and a High Frequency Instrument (HFI) onboard. As a survey instrument, Planck results will be the most important data to further our understanding of cosmology and will answer some fundamental questions, such as how stars form and how they evolved in our own Milky Way galaxy.
The LFI will detect frequencies in the general range of a regular radio, though the device is much more sophisticated. The HFI detectors, cooled cryogenically to just above absolute zero, will sense even the slightest amounts of radiation in a much higher frequency range.
The Canadian contribution is mainly software for the telescope, including a plotting and analysis tool called Kst. This software was originally created by CIFAR Cosmology and Gravity Fellow Barth Netterfield and used for the BLAST and Boomerang experiments.
“Not only will we be collecting some unique and interesting information about the Universe, we will also be maximizing technologies,” says Cosmology and Gravity program Director Dick Bond who has been involved with the project since 1993. “Planck is the BMW version of the WMAP.”
Researchers will calibrate the HFI by comparing its data to other CMB experiments. Three CIFAR researchers, Netterfield, Bond, and Mike Nolta, will use data from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) in Chile, WMAP and SPIDER for this calibration phase.
The exceptionally sensitive instruments on board Planck will also give greater insight into the nature of the mysterious dark matter that makes up 26% of the Universe. Planck will give clues to this previously unknown aspect of the Universe and create the most accurate picture of the very early Universe to date.
This story relates to our research program: Cosmology and Gravity