TRIS II: search for CMB spectral distortions at 0.60, 0.82 and 2.5 GHz

TL;DR

This study used the TRIS experiment to measure the sky brightness at three radio frequencies, improving constraints on the CMB temperature and spectral distortions, including free-free and Bose-Einstein distortions.

Contribution

It provides new, more precise measurements of the CMB temperature at multiple frequencies and tighter limits on spectral distortions compared to previous studies.

Findings

Measured CMB temperature at 0.60 GHz as 2.837 K

Set new limits on free-free distortions: -6.3e-6 to 12.6e-6

Improved Bose-Einstein distortion upper limit to |μ| < 6e-5

Abstract

With the TRIS experiment we have performed absolute measurements of the sky brightness in a sky circle at $\delta = +42^{\circ}$ at the frequencies $\nu =$ 0.60, 0.82 and 2.5 GHz. In this paper we discuss the techniques used to separate the different contributions to the sky emission and give an evaluation of the absolute temperature of the Cosmic Microwave Background. For the black-body temperature of the CMB we get: $T_{cmb}^{th}=(2.837 \pm 0.129 \pm 0.066)K$ at $\nu=0.60$ GHz; $T_{cmb}^{th}=(2.803 \pm 0.051 ^{+0.430} _{-0.300})K$ at $\nu=0.82$ GHz; $T_{cmb}^{th}=(2.516 \pm 0.139 \pm 0.284)K$ at $\nu=2.5$ GHz. The first error bar is statistic (1$\sigma$) while the second one is systematic. These results represent a significant improvement with respect to the previous measurements. We have also set new limits to the free-free distortions, $ -6.3 \times 10^{-6} < Y_{ff} < 12.6 \times 10^{-6}$, and slightly improved the Bose-Einstein upper limit, $|\mu| < 6 \times 10^{-5}$, both at 95% confidence level.