arXiv · 0811.1639
Signals of Statistical Anisotropy in WMAP Foreground-Cleaned Maps
Abstract
Recently a symmetry-based method to test for statistical isotropy of the cosmic microwave background was developed. We apply the method to template-cleaned 3-year and 5-year WMAP-$DA$ maps. We examine a wide range of angular multipoles from $2 < l < 300$. The analysis detects statistically signicant signals of anisotropy inconsistent with an isotropic CMB in some of the foreground cleaned maps. We are unable to resolve whether the anomalies have a cosmological, local astrophysical or instrumental origin. Assuming the anisotropy arises due to residual foreground contamination, we estimate the residual foreground power in the maps. For the W band maps, we also find a highly improbable degree of isotropy we cannot explain. We speculate that excess isotropy may be caused by faulty modeling of detector noise.
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Pramoda Kumar Samal, Rajib Saha, Pankaj Jain, John P. Ralston. 2008-11-28. Signals of Statistical Anisotropy in WMAP Foreground-Cleaned Maps. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.14728.x
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