The Keck Array: a pulse tube cooled CMB polarimeter
C. D. Sheehy, P. A. R. Ade, R. W. Aikin, M. Amiri, S. Benton, C., Bischoff, J. J. Bock, J. A. Bonetti, J. A. Brevik, B. Burger, C. D. Dowell,, L. Duband, J. P. Filippini, S. R. Golwala, M. Halpern, M. Hasselfield, G., Hilton, V. V. Hristov, K. Irwin, J. P. Kaufman, B. G. Keating

TL;DR
The Keck Array is a new CMB polarimeter using pulse tube cooled cryostats, demonstrating reliable detector performance and enabling advanced observations from the South Pole.
Contribution
It introduces the design and performance of the Keck cryostat and shows that pulse tube cooling does not impair detector performance.
Findings
Detectors operate effectively with pulse tube cooling.
Cryostat design is suitable for CMB observations.
Initial results confirm system reliability.
Abstract
The Keck Array is a cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarimeter that will begin observing from the South Pole in late 2010. The initial deployment will consist of three telescopes similar to BICEP2 housed in ultra-compact, pulse tube cooled cryostats. Two more receivers will be added the following year. In these proceedings we report on the design and performance of the Keck cryostat. We also report some initial results on the performance of antenna-coupled TES detectors operating in the presence of a pulse tube. We find that the performance of the detectors is not seriously impacted by the replacement of BICEP2's liquid helium cryostat with a pulse tube cooled cryostat.
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Taxonomy
TopicsSuperconducting and THz Device Technology · Radio Astronomy Observations and Technology · Spacecraft and Cryogenic Technologies
