Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect

The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect (often abbreviated as the SZ effect) is the result of high energy electrons distorting the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) through inverse Compton scattering, in which some of the energy of the electrons is transferred to the low energy CMB photons. Observed distortions of the cosmic microwave background spectrum are used to detect the density perturbations of the universe. Using the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect, dense clusters of galaxies have been observed.

Introduction

The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect can be divided into:

* thermal effects, where the CMB photons interact with electrons that have high energies due to their temperature
* kinematic effects, a second-order effect where the CMB photons interact with electrons that have high energies due to their bulk motion (also called the Ostriker-Vishniac effect, after Jeremiah P. Ostriker and Ethan Vishniac. [Ostriker and Vishniac, "Effect of gravitational lenses on the microwave background, and 1146+111B,C" Nature (ISSN 0028-0836), vol. 322, Aug. 28, 1986, p. 804.] )
* polarization

Rashid Sunyaev and Yakov Zel'dovich predicted the effect, and conducted research in 1969, 1972, and 1980. The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect is of major astrophysical and cosmological interest. It can help determine the value of the Hubble constant. To distinguish the SZ effect due to galaxy clusters from ordinary density perturbations, both the spectral dependence and the spatial dependence of fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background are used. Analysis of CMB data at higher angular resolution (high l values) requires taking into account the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect.

Current research is focused on modelling how the effect is generated by the intra-cluster plasma in galaxy clusters, and on using the effect to estimate the Hubble constant and to separate different components in the angular average statistics of fluctuations in the background. Hydrodynamic structure formation simulations are being studied to gain data on thermal and kinetic effects in the theory. Observations are difficult due to the small amplitude of the effect and to confusion with experimental error and other sources of CMB temperature fluctuations. However, since the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect is a scattering effect, its magnitude is independent of redshift. This is very important: it means that clusters at high redshift can be detected just as easily as those at low redshift. Another factor which facilitates high-redshift cluster detection is the angular scale versus redshift relation: it changes little between redshifts of 0.3 and 2, meaning that clusters between these redshifts have similar sizes on the sky.

Timeline of observations

* 1983 — Researchers from the Cambridge Radio Astronomy Group and the Owens Valley Radio Observatory first detect the "Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect" from clusters of galaxies.
* 1993 — The Ryle Telescope begins regular observations of the "Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect" from clusters of galaxies
* 2003 — The WMAP satellite maps the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) over the whole sky with some (limited) sensitivity to the "Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect"
* 2005 — The Arcminute Microkelvin Imager and the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Array each begin surveys for very high redshift clusters of galaxies using the "Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect"
* 2007 — The South Pole Telescope (SPT) saw first light on February 16, 2007, and began science observations in March of that same year.
* 2007 — The Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) saw first light on June 8, and will soon begin an SZ survey of galaxy clusters
* 2008 Dark flow effects discovered. [ [http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2008/dark_flow.html NASA] article "Scientists Detect Cosmic 'Dark Flow' Across Billions of Light Years" published September 23, 2008]

See also

* Background radiation
* Compton effect
* Cosmic background radiation
* Cosmic microwave background radiation
* Rashid Sunyaev
* Yakov Zel'dovich
* Yoel Rephaeli

References

Journals

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* | title = Magnetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect in galaxy clusters | journal = ApJL
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* | title = Hydrodynamic Simulations of the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect(s) | journal = ApJ
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Further reading

* Royal Astronomical Society, "Corrupted echoes from the Big Bang?" RAS Press Notice PN 04/01

External links

* [http://www.innovations-report.com/html/reports/physics_astronomy/report-25349.html Corrupted echoes from the Big Bang?] innovations-report.com.