The Sunyaev-Zeldovich Effect as Microwave Foreground and Probe of Cosmology

TL;DR

The paper discusses how the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect impacts cosmic microwave background observations and how it can be used as a tool to study cosmology and the evolution of galaxy clusters.

Contribution

It highlights the potential of combining SZ and X-ray observations with CMB data to probe cosmological parameters and cluster evolution.

Findings

SZ effect significantly affects small-scale CMB measurements.

SZ surveys can help isolate cosmological signals from foregrounds.

Combining SZ with X-ray data improves distance measurements to clusters.

Abstract

The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) effect from clusters of galaxies should yield a significant signal in cosmic microwave background(CMB) experiments at small angular scales ($\ell \ga 1000$). Experiments with sufficient frequency coverage should be able to remove much of this signal in order to recover the primary anisotropy. The SZ signal is interesting in its own right; the amplitude and angular dependence are sensitive to both cosmology and the evolution of the gas. Combining CMB measurements with planned non-targeted SZ surveys could isolate the cosmological effects, providing CMB experiments with a low-redshift test of cosmology as a consistency check. Improvements in the determination of the angular diameter distance as a function of redshift from SZ and X-ray observations of a large sample of clusters will also provide a probe of cosmology.