• DOI:10.1103/PhysRevD.76.043002
• Corpus ID: 119360903

Signature of patchy reionization in the polarization anisotropy of the CMB

@article{Dore2007SignatureOP,
  title={Signature of patchy reionization in the polarization anisotropy of the CMB},
  author={Olivier Dor'e and Gilbert P. Holder and Marcelo A. Alvarez and Ilian T. Iliev and Garrelt Mellema and Ue-li Pen and Paul R. Shapiro},
  journal={Physical Review D},
  year={2007},
  volume={76},
  pages={043002}
}

• O. Dor'e, G. Holder, +4 authors P. Shapiro
• Published 29 January 2007
• Physics, Geology
• Physical Review D

The inhomogeneous ionization state of the universe when the first sources of ionizing radiation appeared should lead to anisotropies in the polarization of the cosmic microwave background. We use cosmological simulations of the process by which the first sources ionized the intergalactic medium to study the induced polarization anisotropies. We find that the polarization anisotropies have rms of order {approx} 0.01 {mu}K, and local peak values of {approx} 0.1 {mu}K, smaller than those due to gravitational lensing on small scales. The polarization direction is highly coherent over degree scales. This directional coherence is not expected from either primary anisotropy or gravitational lensing effects, making the largest signals due to inhomogeneous ionization relatively easy to isolate, should experiments achieve the necessary very low noise levels.