vic haynes

We review a number of technologies that are candidates for active polarization modulators for CMBPol. The technologies are appropriate for instruments that use bolometric detectors and include birefringent crystal-based and metal-mesh-based half-wave plates, variable phase polarization modulator, Faraday rotator, and photolithographed modulators. We also give a current account of the status of millimeter-wave orthomode transducers.

ABSTRACT ArTeMiS is a submillimeter camera planned to work simultaneously at 450 μm, 350 μm and 200 μm by use of 3 focal planes of, respectively, 8, 8 and 4 bolometric arrays, each one made of 16 x18 pixels. In July 2013, with a preliminary setting reduced to 4 modules and to the 350 μm band, ArTeMiS was installed successfully at the Cassegrain focus of APEX, a 12 m antenna located on the Chajnantor plateau, Chile. After the summary of the scientific requirements, we describe the main lines of the ArTeMiS nominal optical design with its rationale and performances. This optical design is highly constrained by the room allocation available in the Cassegrain cabin. It is an all-reflective design including a retractable pick off mirror, a warm Fore Optics to image the focal plane of the telescope inside the cryostat, and the cold optics. The large size of the field of view at the focal plane of the telescope, 72 mm x 134 mm for the 350 μm and 450 μm beams, leads to the use of biconical toroidal mirrors. In this way, the nominal image quality obtained on the bolometric arrays is only just diffraction limited at some corners of the field of view. To keep a final PSF as much uniform as possible across the field of view, we have used the technic of manufacturing by diamond turning to machine the mirrors. This approach, while providing high accuracy on the shape of the mirrors, made easier the control of the two sub units, the Fore Optics and the cold optics, in the visible domain and at room temperature. Moreover, the use of the similar material (Aluminium alloy 6061) for the optical bench and the mirrors with their mount ensures a homothetic shrinking during the cooling down. The alignment protocol, drew up at the early step of the study, is also presented. It required the implementation of two additional mechanisms inside the cryostat to check the optical axis of the cold optics, in the real conditions of operation of ArTeMiS. In this way, it was possible to pre-align the Fore Optics sub unit with respect to the cold optics. Finally, despite the high constraints of the operating conditions of APEX, this protocol allowed to align ArTeMiS with respect to the telescope in a single adjustment. The first images obtained on the sky, Saturn with its rings, are given.

We describe the optical design and performance of ’QUEST and DASI’ or ’QUaD’, a ground-based high-resolution experiment designed to measure the polarisation properties of the cosmic microwave background radiation. QUaD uses bolometric detectors at 100 and 150 GHz on a 2.6 m Cassegrain telescope. The QUaD optics are designed to minimise systematic effects as well as to maximise sensitivity, and we report here on the comprehensive quasi-optical analysis used to achieve this design. We also present initial optical performance measurements achieved in operation, and discuss changes made to the optics to overcome some errors in the mechanical construction of the primary mirror. The QUaD experiment is now fully operational and taking world-leading data at the South Pole.

We describe the QUaD experiment, a millimeter-wavelength polarimeter designed to observe the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) from a site at the South Pole. The experiment comprises a 2.64 m Cassegrain telescope equipped with a cryogenically cooled receiver containing an array of 62 polarization-sensitive bolometers. The focal plane contains pixels at two different frequency bands, 100 GHz and 150 GHz, with angular resolutions of 5 arcmin and 3.5 arcmin, respectively. The high angular resolution allows observation of CMB temperature and polarization anisotropies over a wide range of scales. The instrument commenced operation in early 2005 and collected science data during three successive Austral winter seasons of observation.

One of the major challenges of modern cosmology is the detection of B-mode polarization anisotropies in the Cosmic Microwave Background. These originate from tensor fluctuations of the metric produced during the inflationary phase. Their detection would therefore constitute a major step towards understanding the primordial Universe. The expected level of these anisotropies is however so small that it requires a new generation of instruments with high sensitivity and extremely good control of systematic effects.We propose the QUBIC instrument based on the novel concept of bolometric interferometry, bringing together the sensitivity advantages of bolometric detectors with the systematics effects advantages of interferometry.The instrument will directly observe the sky through an array of entry horns whose signals will be combined together using an optical combiner. The whole set-up is located inside a cryostat. Polarization modulation will be achieved using a rotating half-wave plate and the images of the interference fringes will be formed on two focal planes (separated by a polarizing grid) tiled with bolometers.We show that QUBIC can be considered as a synthetic imager, exactly similar to a usual imager but with a synthesized beam formed by the array of entry horns. Scanning the sky provides an additional modulation of the signal and improve the sky coverage shape. The usual techniques of map-making and power spectrum estimation can then be applied. We show that the sensitivity of such an instrument is comparable with that of an imager with the same number of horns. We anticipate a low level of beam-related systematics thanks to the fact that the synthesized beam is determined by the location of the primary horns. Other systematics should be under good control thanks to an autocalibration technique, specific to our concept, that will permit the accurate determination of most of the instrumental parameters that would otherwise lead to systematics.

A metal-mesh achromatic half-wave plate (HWP) has been designed, manufactured, and tested for potential use in millimeter and submillimeter astronomical instruments. The prototype device presented here is based on a 12-grid Shatrow [IEEE Trans. Antennas Propag. 43, 109 (1995)] recipe to operate over the frequency range of 120-180 GHz. Transmission line modeling and finite-element analysis [Ansoft HFSS website: http://www.ansoft.com/hfss/] were used to optimize the design geometrical parameters in terms of the device transmission, reflection, absorption, phase-shift, and cross-polarization as a function of frequency. The resulting prototype device was constructed and characterized using incoherent radiation from a polarizing Fourier transform spectrometer to explore its frequency and polarization behavior. These measurements are shown to be in excellent agreement with the models. Lists of the achieved HWP performance characteristics are reported.

A flat lens based on subwavelength periodic metal meshes has been developed using photolithographic techniques. These mesh grids are stacked at specific distances and embedded in polypropylene. A code was developed to optimize more than 1000 transmission line circuits required to vary the device phase shift across the lens flat surface, mimicking the behavior of a classical lens. A W-band mesh-lens prototype was successfully manufactured and its RF performance characterized using a vector network analyzer coupled to corrugated horn antennas. Co-polarization far-field beam patterns were measured and compared with finite-element method models. The excellent agreement between data and simulations validated our designing tools and manufacturing procedures. This mesh lens is a low-loss, robust, light, and compact device that has many potential applications including millimeter wave quasi-optical systems for future cosmic microwave background polarization instruments.