Simons Observatory

SOLogo

Simons Observatory (SO) is a funded expansion to the Chajnantor Plateau’s system of telescopes. SO is essentially a conglomeration of the Simons Array (SA) and Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) collaborations to combine cutting-edge technologies into the world’s most powerful ground-based CMB polarization experiment. Not only will SO be the most sensitive CMB instrument when it deploys, it will also serve as a stepping stone to CMB-S4.

simonsarray_wide — A photograph of the Chajnantor Observatory in Chile in 2017. Simons Observatory conglomerates the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (large bowl in the background) and Simons Array (three telescopes in the foreground) collaborations into a single project. Photo credit: Nate Stebor

SO was funded in 2015 and is looking to begin observations in 2022. The project is led by Principal Investigators Brian Keating of UC San Diego, Adrian Lee of UC Berkeley, Mark Devlin of the University of Pennsylvania, and Suzanne Staggs, David Spergel, and Lyman Page of Princeton University.

OrgDiagram — An overview organizational diagram of the BoloCalc sensitivity calculator developed for Simons Observatory. The modular structure is intended to make the suite useful to other collaborations within the CMB community.

My involvement in SO focused primarily on sensitivity calculations to inform instrument design decisions. Specifically, I designed a Python code base called BoloCalc to build simulation telescope models and estimate the speed with which they will map the CMB.

For more information about Simons Observatory, visit its website!