First Constraints on the Epoch of Reionization Using the non-Gaussianity of the Kinematic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect from the South Pole Telescope and {\it Herschel}-SPIRE Observations

• Published in: Physical Review Letters
• Main Authors: Raghunathan, S, Ade, P.A.R, Anderson, A.J, Ansarinejad, B, Archipley, M, Austermann, J.E, Balkenhol, L, Beall, J.A, Benabed, K, Bender, A.N, Benson, B.A, Bianchini, F, Bleem, L.E, Bock, J, Bouchet, F.R, Bryant, L, Camphuis, E, Carlstrom, J.E, Cecil, T.W, Chang, C.L, Chaubal, P, Chiang, H.C, Chichura, P.M, Chou, T.-L, Citron, R, Coerver, A, Crawford, T.M, Crites, A.T, Cukierman, A, Daley, C, Dibert, K.R, Dobbs, M.A, Doussot, A, Dutcher, D, Everett, W, Feng, C, Ferguson, K.R, Fichman, K, Foster, A, Galli, S, Gallicchio, J, Gambrel, A.E, Gardner, R.W, Ge, F, George, E.M, Goeckner-Wald, N, Gualtieri, R, Guidi, F, Guns, S, Gupta, N, de Haan, T, Halverson, N.W, Hivon, E, Holder, G.P, Holzapfel, W.L, Hood, J.C, Hrubes, J.D, Hryciuk, A, Huang, N, Hubmayr, J, Irwin, K.D, Kéruzoré, F, Knox, L, Korman, M, Kornoelje, K, Kuo, C.-L, Lee, A.T, Levy, K, Li, D, Lowitz, A.E, Lu, C, Maniyar, A, Mcmahon, J.J, Menanteau, F, Millea, M, Montgomery, J, Moran, C. Corbett, Nakato, Y, Natoli, T, Nibarger, J.P, Noble, G.I, Novosad, V, Omori, Y, Padin, S, Pan, Z, Paschos, P, Patil, S, Phadke, K.A, Prabhu, K, Pryke, C, Quan, W, Rahimi, M, Rahlin, A, Reichardt, C.L, Rouble, M, Ruhl, J.E, Saliwanchik, B.R, Schaffer, K.K, Schiappucci, E, Sievers, C, Smecher, G, Sobrin, J.A, Stark, A.A, Stephen, J, Suzuki, A, Tandoi, C, Thompson, K.L, Thorne, B, Trendafilova, C, Tucker, C, Umilta, C, Veach, T, Vieira, J.D, Viero, M.P, Wan, Y, Wang, G, Whitehorn, N, Wu, W.L.K, Yefremenko, V, Young, M.R, Zebrowski, J.A, Zemcov, M
• Other Authors: Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris (IAP), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), SPT-3G, SPTpol
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2024
• Subjects: [PHYS.ASTR]Physics [physics]/Astrophysics [astro-ph]; Gunn; South Pole; South pole
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-04510904; https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.133.121004

International audience We report results from an analysis aimed at detecting the trispectrum of the kinematic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (kSZ) effect by combining data from the South Pole Telescope (SPT) and {\it Herschel}-SPIRE experiments over a 100 ${\rm deg}^{2}$ field. The SPT observations combine data from the previous and current surveys, namely SPTpol and SPT-3G, to achieve depths of 4.5, 3, and 16 $\mu {\rm K-arcmin}$ in bands centered at 95, 150, and 220 GHz. For SPIRE, we include data from the 600 and 857 GHz bands. We reconstruct the velocity-induced large-scale correlation of the small-scale kSZ signal with a quadratic estimator that uses two cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature maps, constructed by optimally combining data from all the frequency bands. We reject the null hypothesis of a zero trispectrum at $10.3\sigma$ level. However, the measured trispectrum contains contributions from both the kSZ and other undesired components, such as CMB lensing and astrophysical foregrounds, with kSZ being sub-dominant. We use the \textsc{Agora} simulations to estimate the expected signal from CMB lensing and astrophysical foregrounds. After accounting for the contributions from CMB lensing and foreground signals, we do not detect an excess kSZ-only trispectrum and use this non-detection to set constraints on reionization. By applying a prior based on observations of the Gunn-Peterson trough, we obtain an upper limit on the duration of reionization of $\Delta z_{\rm re, 50} < 4.5$ (95% C.L). We find these constraints are fairly robust to foregrounds assumptions. This trispectrum measurement is independent of, but consistent with, {\it Planck}'s optical depth measurement. This result is the first constraint on the epoch of reionization using the non-Gaussian nature of the kSZ signal.