F2a: Support to PCCP

The Paris Centre for Cosmological Physics is a place of research, education and scientific exchanges in the field of cosmology, or more generally the physics of the Universe. It was created in February 2010 by George F. Smoot. The LabEx UnivEarthS contributes to the financing of some of the actions of PCCP such as the organization of workshops, visitors and postdoctoral programs, but also the training of high school teachers and the realization of a general public MOOC to share a scientific adventure on the frontiers of the knowledge. Other support for PCCP comes from University Paris Diderot (in the form of a “structuring action”), Sorbonne Paris Cité, the Endowment Fund “Physics of the
Universe” and the region Ile-de-France (Greater Paris). As asked by the Scientific Committee, the focus since 2014 has been outreach and training, with the continuation of the successful “Teaching the Universeprogram for high school teachers, and the implementation of a MOOC (Massive Open On—line Course) entitled “Gravity! From Big Bang to Black Holes”. Last year (2016) the PCCP initiated, with the help of UnivEarthS
a valorization program together with GEPI, on Microwave Kinetic Inductance detectors, also under the leadership of Pierre Binetruy. We will report the results of this program separately.

The death of Pierre Binetruy on April 1st 2017 had of course a decisive impact on the activities of this workpackage. S. Katsanevas director of APC, with the help of Marie Verleure, took over some of the tasks, but these were added on his already very heavy agenda, so delays were unavoidable. Matteo Barsuglia was appointed as PCCP director at end of July 2018, and he is in the process to restart the various activities of the center.

1. Eduction and outreach

MOOC Gravity.

Starting in 2015, the PCCP realized the English version of the MOOC: Gravity! This was not
just a translation but a whole new course adapted to the British platform Futurelearn, significantly different in spirit from the French platform. It is considered among the most successful MOCC’s worldwide, since it currently counts close to 100.000 inscriptions.
Two highlights of the course were a hangout on Nove ber 18 2015 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of General Relativity with a cast of distinguished scientists (Roger Blandford, Karsten Danzmann, Gaby Gonzalez, Thomas Hertog and George Smoot), and a hangout live from Kourou with the chief of operations, and the whole LISAPathfinder technical team, a few hours before the successful launch.
The course was also launched in London with a 3-day exhibit of the Kinetica Museum entitled Gravity! This was the first exploration of the art and science connection (see below). In order to streamline this effort, it was created, with the support of the Labex communication (C. Epitalon), a dedicated website gravity.paris, where learners can find information of the gravitational Universe and the latest news. And news there were since a month later, on February 11 2016, the discovery of gravitational waves was announced. We took this opportunity to invite our (at the time) 70 000 learners to Paris for a Gravitational Wave Fiesta.

MOOC activities 2017.

The 3rd instalment of MOOC Gravity on FUTURELEARN platform was webcast from
30/01/2017 to 12/03/2017. Attending results were even better than the two previous sessions. According to the different levels of involvement there were 7912 Joiners, 4031 (51%) Learners, 1195 (29,6%) Social learners (present on the forum) and 1089 (27%) finished the whole course.
Special relations with a private High School (International School Jeannine—Manuel in Paris ) have been developed in the context of the MOOC. P/ Binetruy visited their classes and answered questions. In the future M. Barsuglia is continuing this activity. They were shown the labs, followed lectures and the Nobel announcement and participated in a questions and answers session.

Teaching the Universe.

The program “Teaching the Universe” is continuing as well. There was a new session on November 16-18 2016. A session of “Teaching the Universe” was performed in Athens.

CMB detection workshop

Map of cosmology concepts

2. Research

Postdocs and scientific activity. Our scientific activities in the field of cosmology and gravitation continued actively, with a significant contribution of our PCCP fellows. Among them:

• Valerie Domcke was awarded on October 12 2016 one of the L’Oreal-UNESCO fellowships for Women and Science. She was also offered a 5-year position from the Theory Group of the DESY laboratory in Hamburg (an excellent position, especially for a young candidate), which she accepted. She ended her contract on September 2017.

• Dhiraj K. HAZRA: He ended his contract in October 2017. He started a contract at IASF Bologna, Italy

• Mauro Pieroni defended his Ph.D. thesis on September 28 2016. He was received for 6 months by the PCCP after his PhD. He is now on a postdoc in Spain Instituto de Física Teórica UAM/CSIC Madrid

• Jie Hu is working on KIDS (kinetic inductance detector) withing the millimetric lab at APC

• Ivan de Bono is working on EUCLID

• Matteo Barsuglia is starting an activity about Cosmology and gravitational-wave in collaboration with the Virgo group and the theory group at APC.

3. Art and Science

Univers 2.0 PCCP, and in particular P. Binetruy, has obtained funding from the Foundation Carasso (40 K€) to initiate an exploration, through a cross-reflection between artists and scientists, of the field that opened through the discovery of gravitational waves putting again at the centre questions on the nature of the space and time, their texture, the notions of origin and horizon, the role of information circulating in the Universe and its conservation or loss, the role of the human as observer and/or perturbator, more generally the nature of our embedding in the cosmos. This reflection will be initially carried out within the multidisciplinary team set up including very well known artists internationally (Gorka Alda, Bertrand Lamarche, Liliane Lijn, Thomas Saraceno, Raymond Galle, Raphael Dallaporta). Philosophers also participate in the discussion (Heinz Wismann, Céline Flécheux). The work program includes for the time being artists residencies, workshops. On the scientist side, there were essentially some of the PCCP scientists and Marc Lachièze Ray. The project will culminate in two year’s time with a restitution seminar, accompanied by an exhibition and a publication.

In the context of this program, several meetings between art and scientists were already organized.

PCCP PUBLICATIONS LIST: LabEx UnivEarthS WPF2A

A Soliton Solution for the Central Dark Masses in Globular Clusters and Implications for the Axiverse

Razieh Emami, Tom Broadhurst, George Smoot, Tzihong Chiueh, Luu Hoang Nhan

12 Juin 2018

arXiv:1806.04518 [astro-ph.CO]

Characteristics and energy dependence of recurrent galactic cosmic-ray flux depressions and of a Forbush decrease with LISA Pathfinder

Armano, H. Audley, J. Baird, M. Bassan, S. Benella, P. Binetruy, M. Born, D. Bortoluzzi, A. Cavalleri, A. Cesarini, A. M. Cruise, K. Danzmann, M. de Deus Silva, I. Diepholz, G. Dixon, R. Dolesi, M. Fabi, L. Ferraioli, V. Ferroni, N. Finetti, E. D. Fitzsimons, M. Freschi, L. Gesa, F. Gibert, D. Giardini, R. Giusteri, C. Grimani, J. Grzymisch, I. Harrison, G. Heinzel, M. Hewitson, D. Hollington, D. Hoyland, M. Hueller, H. Inchauspé, O. Jennrich, P. Jetzer, N. Karnesis, B. Kaune, N. Korsakova, C. J. Killow, M. Laurenza, J. A. Lobo, I. Lloro, L. Liu, J. P. López-Zaragoza, R. Maarschalkerweerd, D. Mance, V. Martín, L. Martin-Polo, J. Martino, F. Martin-Porqueras, I. Mateos, P. W. McNamara, J. Mendes, L. Mendes, M. Nofrarias, S. Paczkowski, M. Perreur-Lloyd, A. Petiteau, P. Pivato, et al. (24 additional authors not shown)

23 avril 2018

arXiv:1802.09374 [physics.space-ph]

Measuring the Galactic Cosmic Ray Flux with the LISA Pathfinder Radiation Monitor

M Armano, H Audley, J Baird, P Binetruy, M Born, D Bortoluzzi, E Castelli, A Cavalleri, A Cesarini, M Cruise, K Danzmann, M de Deus Silva, I Diepholz, G Dixon, R Dolesi, L Ferraioli, V Ferroni, N Finetti, E D Fitzsimons, M Freschi, L Gesa, F Gibert, D Giardini, R Giusteri, C Grimani, J Grzymisch, I Harrison, G Heinzel, M Hewitson, D Hollington, D Hoyland, M Hueller, H Inchauspe, O Jennrich, P Jetzer, N Karnesis, B Kaune, N Korsakova, C J Killow, J A Lobo, I Lloro, L Liu, J P Lopez-Zaragoza, R Maarschalkerweerd, D Mance, N Meshskar, V Martin, L Martin-Polo, J Martino, F Martin-Porqueras, I Mateos, P W McNamara, J Mendes, L Mendes, M Nofrarias, S Paczkowski, M Perreur-Lloyd, A Petiteau, P Pivato, E Plagnol, J Ramos-Castro, J Reiche, D I Robertson, F Rivas, G Russano, J Slutsky, C F Sopuerta, et al. (12 additional authors not shown)

12 janvier 2018

arXiv:1711.07427 [astro-ph.IM]

B.P.Abbott,
GW170817: Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Neutron Star Inspiral,
Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 161101 (2017)

B.P. Abbott et al, (02 November 2017)
A gravitational-wave standard siren measurement of the Hubble constant, 
Nature 551, 85–88

Evidence of Neutrino Enhanced Clustering in a Complete Sample of Sloan Survey Clusters,

Implying  

Razieh Emami, Tom Broadhurst, Pablo Jimeno, George Smoot, Raul Angulo, Jeremy Lim, Ming Chung Chu, Ruth Lazkoz

18 Novembre 2017

arXiv:1711.05210v2 [astro-ph.CO]

Probing features in the primordial perturbation spectrum with large-scale structure data

Benjamin L’Huillier (KASI), Arman Shafieloo (KASI), Dhiraj Kumar Hazra, George F. Smoot, Alexei A. Starobinsky

30 Octobre 2017

arXiv:1710.10987 (astro-ph.CO)

Probing features in inflaton potential and reionization history with future CMB space observations

Dhiraj Kumar Hazra, Daniela Paoletti,Mario Ballardini, Fabio Finelli, Arman Shafieloo, George F. Smoot, Alexei A. Starobinsky. Oct.3, 2017

https://arXiv:1710.01205v1 [astro-ph.CO]

Observational Constraints on the Primordial Curvature Power Spectrum

Razieh Emami and George F. Smoot.

September 26, 2017.

https://arXiv:1705.09924v2 [astro-ph.CO]

Neutrino masses, leptogenesis and dark matter From small lepton number violation?

Asmaa Abada, Giorgio Arcadi, Valerie Domcke and Michele Lucente.

September 5, 2017

https://arXiv:1709.00415v1 [hep-ph]

Witnessing the reionization history using Cosmic Microwave Background observation from Planck

Dhiraj Kumar Hazra, George F. Smoot.

August 16, 2017

https://arXiv:1708.04913v1 [astro-ph.CO]

PBH dark matter from axion inflation
Valerie Domcke (APC, Paris), Francesco Muia (Paris Cent. Cosmol. Phys.), Mauro Pieroni, Lukas T. Witkowski (APC, Paris).

Apr 11, 2017.

https://arXiv:1704.03464v2 [astro-ph.CO]

Universality in generalized models of inflation

Pierre Binétruy, Joel Mabillard, Mauro Pieroni.

April 6, 2017.

https://arXiv:1611.07019v2 [gr-qc]

Detection prospects for the Cosmic Neutrino Background using laser interferometers

Valerie Domcke, Martin Spinrath

April 11, 2017

https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.08629 [astro-ph.CO]

A Unified Model of D-Term Inflation

Valerie Domcke and Kai Schmitz

February 9, 2017

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1702.02173 [hep-ph]

Metastable Dark Energy with Radioactive-like Decay

Date of publication: 2016-10-17

Authors: Arman Shafieloo, Dhiraj Kumar Hazra, Varun Sahni, Alexei A. Starobinsky

arxiv.org/abs/1610.05192  [astro-ph.CO]

Consistency of the Planck CMB data and ΛCDM cosmology

Date of publication: 2016-10-24

Authors: Arman Shafieloo, Dhiraj Kumar Hazra

arxiv.org/abs/1609.09781 [gr-qc]

General Relativity and Cosmology: Unsolved Questions and Future Directions

Ivan Debono, George F. Smoot

Sept. 2016, Journal-ref: Universe. 2016; 2(4):23

e-print : arXiv:1609.09781 [astro-ph.CO]

A Brief History of Gravitational Waves

Jorge L. Cervantes-Cota, Salvador Galindo-Uribarri, George F. Smoot

Sept. 2016, Journal-ref: Universe 2016, 2(3), 22

e-print : arXiv:1609.09400 [astro-ph.HE]