Cosmic Microwave Background

The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) is the remnant of the first light that could ever travel freely throughout the universe. This light is in the microwave part of the electromagnetic spectrum that was emitted from the most distant parts of the universe that we can see. It consists of the blackbody photons produced by the early universe and the density fluctuations of this hot, dense early universe can be seen within it.

The Code for Anisotropies in the Microwave Background (CAMB) is an application that computes cosmic microwave background spectra given a set of input cosmological parameters. Parameters such as baryon density, the Hubble Constant, and CMB temperature can be changed to see how it would affect the CMB map as we know it today.

Using CAMB, the following plots could be created with the leftmost having the same baryon density as our current universe (0.0226), while the one on the right has a baryon density of 0.1. These maps are explained in more detail in the poster below.

CMB Map of 0.0226 Baryon Density
CMB Map of 0.1 Baryon Density

More on the CMB and how it would change with different cosmological constants can be found in the PowerPoint below.

CAMB poster