A. Benoit

Planck pre-launch status: The HFI instrument, from specification to actual performance

Context. The High Frequency Instrument (HFI) is one of the two focal instruments of the Planck mission. It will observe the whole sky in six bands in the 100 GHz-1 THz range. Aims: The HFI instrument is designed to measure the cosmic microwave background (CMB) with a sensitivity limited only by fundamental sources: the photon noise of the CMB itself and the residuals left after the removal of foregrounds. The two high frequency bands will provide full maps of the submillimetre sky, featuring mainly extended and point source foregrounds. Systematic effects must be kept at negligible levels or accurately monitored so that the signal can be corrected. This paper describes the HFI design and its characteristics deduced from ground tests and calibration. Methods: The HFI instrumental concept and architecture are feasible only by pushing new techniques to their extreme capabilities, mainly: (i) bolometers working at 100 mK and absorbing the radiation in grids; (ii) a dilution cooler providing 100 mK in microgravity conditions; (iii) a new type of AC biased readout electronics and (iv) optical channels using devices inspired from radio and infrared techniques. Results: The Planck-HFI instrument performance exceeds requirements for sensitivity and control of systematic effects. During ground-based calibration and tests, it was measured at instrument and system levels to be close to or better than the goal specification.

Cosmological constraints from Archeops

We analyze the cosmological constraints that Archeops places on adiabatic cold dark matter models with passive power-law initial fluctuations. Because its angular power spectrum has small bins in l and large l coverage down to COBE scales, Archeops provides a precise determination of the first acoustic peak in terms of position at multipole l_peak=220 +- 6, height and width. An analysis of Archeops data in combination with other CMB datasets constrains the baryon content of the Universe, Omega(b)h^2 = 0.022 (+0.003,-0.004), compatible with Big-Bang nucleosynthesis and with a similar accuracy. Using cosmological priors obtainedfrom recent non-CMB data leads to yet tighter constraints on the total density, e.g. Omega(tot)=1.00 (+0.03,-0.02) using the HST determination of the Hubble constant. An excellent absolute calibration consistency is found between Archeops and other CMB experiments, as well as with the previously quoted best fit model.The spectral index n is measured to be 1.04 (+0.10,-0.12) when the optical depth to reionization, tau, is allowed to vary as a free parameter, and 0.96 (+0.03,-0.04) when tau is fixed to zero, both in good agreement with inflation.

The cosmic microwave background anisotropy power spectrum measured by archeops

We present a determination by the Archeops experiment of the angular power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background anisotropy in 16 bins over the multipole range l=15-350. Archeops was conceived as a precursor of the Planck HFI instrument by using the same optical design and the same technology for the detectors and their cooling. Archeops is a balloon-borne instrument consisting of a 1.5 m aperture diameter telescope and an array of 21 photometers maintained at ~100 mK that are operating in 4 frequency bands centered at 143, 217, 353 and 545 GHz. The data were taken during the Arctic night of February 7, 2002 after the instrument was launched by CNES from Esrange base (Sweden). The entire data cover ~ 30% of the sky.This first analysis was obtained with a small subset of the dataset using the most sensitive photometer in each CMB band (143 and 217 GHz) and 12.6% of the sky at galactic latitudes above 30 degrees where the foreground contamination is measured to be negligible. The large sky coverage and medium resolution (better than 15 arcminutes) provide for the first time a high signal-to-noise ratio determination of the power spectrum over angular scales that include both the first acoustic peak and scales probed by COBE/DMR. With a binning of Delta(l)=7 to 25 the error bars are dominated by sample variance for l below 200. A companion paper details the cosmological implications.

Final results of the EDELWEISS-II WIMP search using a 4-kg array of cryogenic germanium detectors with interleaved electrodes

Abstract The EDELWEISS-II Collaboration has completed a direct search for WIMP dark matter with an array of ten 400-g cryogenic germanium detectors in operation at the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane. The combined use of thermal phonon sensors and charge collection electrodes with an interleaved geometry enables the efficient rejection of γ-induced radioactivity as well as near-surface interactions. A total effective exposure of 384 kg d has been achieved, mostly coming from fourteen months of continuous operation. Five nuclear recoil candidates are observed above 20 keV, while the estimated background is 3.0 events. The result is interpreted in terms of limits on the cross-section of spin-independent interactions of WIMPs and nucleons. A cross-section of 4.4 × 10 − 8 pb is excluded at 90%CL for a WIMP mass of 85 GeV. New constraints are also set on models where the WIMP-nucleon scattering is inelastic.

DC-SQUID magnetization measurements of single magnetic particles

We present the first magnetization measurements of single submicronic particles at very low temperature made of either Ni, Co, CoZrMoNi or TbFe. As detector we use a micro-bridge-DC-SQUID deposited onto or next to the sample. Sample and detector are patterned by electron-beam lithography. The dynamics and the temperature dependence of the magnetization reversal is studied in view of Macroscopic Quantum Tunneling (MQT).

Persistent Currents in Mesoscopic Connected Rings

We report measurements of the low temperature magnetic response of a line of 16 GaAs/GaAlAs connected mesoscopic rings whose total length is much larger than l(straight phi). Using an on-chip micro-SQUID technology, we have measured a periodic response, with period h/e, corresponding to persistent currents in the rings of a typical amplitude of 0.40+/-0.08 nA per ring. Direct comparison with measurements on the same rings but isolated is presented.

A search for low-mass WIMPs with EDELWEISS-II heat-and-ionization detectors

We report on a search for low-energy (E < 20 keV) WIMP-induced nuclear recoils using data collected in 2009 - 2010 by EDELWEISS from four germanium detectors equipped with thermal sensors and an electrode design (ID) which allows to efficiently reject several sources of background. Using an exposure of 113 kg.d, we find no evidence for an exponential distribution of low-energy nuclear recoils that could be attributed to WIMP elastic scattering. For WIMPs of mass 10 GeV, the observation of one event in the WIMP search region results in a 90% CL limit of 1.0 \times 10^-5 pb on the spin-independent WIMP-nucleon scattering cross-section, which constrains the parameter space associated with the findings reported by the CoGeNT, DAMA and CRESST experiments.

Submillimetre point sources from the Archeops experiment: Very Cold Clumps in the Galactic Plane

Aims. Archeops is a balloon-borne experiment, mainly designed to measure the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature anisotropies at high angular resolution (∼12 arcmin). By-products of the mission are shallow sensitivity maps over a large fraction of the sky (about 30%) in the millimetre and submillimetre range at 143, 217, 353 and 545 GHz. From these maps, we produce a catalog of bright submillimetre point sources. Methods. We present in this paper the processing and analysis of the Archeops point sources. Redundancy across detectors is the key factor allowing us to distinguish glitches from genuine point sources in the 20 independent maps. Results. We look at the properties of the most reliable point sources, totalling 304. Fluxes range from 1 to 10 000 Jy (at the frequencies covering 143 to 545 GHz). All sources are either planets (2) or of galactic origin. The longitude range is from 75 to 198 degrees. Some of the sources are associated with the well-known Lynds Nebulae and HII compact regions in the galactic plane. A large fraction of the sources have an IRAS counterpart. Except for Jupiter, Saturn, the Crab and Cas A, all sources show a dust-emission-like modified blackbody emission spectrum. Temperatures cover a range from 7 to 27 K. For the coldest sources (T < 10 K), a steep ν β emissivity law is found with a surprising β ∼ 3 to 4. An inverse relationship between T and β is observed. The number density of sources at 353 GHz with flux brighter than 100 Jy is of the order of 1 per degree of Galactic longitude. These sources will provide a strong check for the calibration of the Planck HFI focal plane geometry as a complement to planets. These very cold sources observed by Archeops should be prime targets for mapping observations by the Akari and Herschel space missions and ground-based observatories.

First results of the EDELWEISS WIMP search using a 320 g heat-and-ionization Ge detector

The EDELWEISS collaboration has performed a direct search for WIMP dark matter using a 320 g heat-and-ionization cryogenic Ge detector operated in a low-background environment in the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane. No nuclear recoils are observed in the fiducial volume in the 30-200 keV energy range during an effective exposure of 4.53 kg.days. Limits for the cross-section for the spin-independent interaction of WIMPs and nucleons are set in the framework of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM). The central value of the signal reported by the experiment DAMA is excluded at 90% CL.

The Planck High Frequency Instrument, a third generation CMB experiment, and a full sky submillimeter survey

The High Frequency Instrument (HFI) of Planck is the most sensitive CMB experiment ever planned. Statistical fluctuations (photon noise) of the CMB itself will be the major limitation to the sensitivity of the CMB channels. Higher frequency channels will measure galactic foregrounds. Together with the Low Frequency Instrument, this will make a unique tool to measure the full sky and to separate the various components of its spectrum. Measurement of the polarization of these various components will give a new picture of the CMB. In addition, HFI will provide the scientific community with new full sky maps of intensity and polarization at six frequencies, with unprecedented angular resolution and sensitivity. This paper describes the logics that prevailed to define the HFI and the performances expected from this instrument. It details several features of the HFI design that has not been published up to now.