CMB-S4 Decadal Survey APC White Paper
Contributors and Endorsers
Kevork Abazajian,
1
Graeme Addison,
2
Peter Adshead,
3
Zeeshan Ahmed,
4
Steven
W. Allen,
5
David Alonso,
6
Marcelo Alvarez,
7,8
Mustafa A. Amin,
9
Adam Anderson,
10
Kam S. Arnold,
11
Carlo Baccigalupi,
12
Kathy Bailey,
13
Denis Barkats,
14
Darcy Barron,
15
Peter S. Barry,
16
James G. Bartlett,
17
Ritoban Basu Thakur,
18
Nicholas Battaglia,
19
Eric Baxter,
20
Rachel Bean,
19
Chris Bebek,
8
Amy N. Bender,
13
Bradford A. Benson,
10
Edo Berger,
21
Sanah Bhimani,
22
Colin A. Bischoff,
23
Lindsey Bleem,
13
James J. Bock,
24
Sebastian Bocquet,
25
Kimberly Boddy,
2
Matteo Bonato,
26,27
J. Richard Bond,
28
Ju-
lian Borrill,
8,7
Franois R. Bouchet,
29
Michael L. Brown,
30
Sean Bryan,
31
Blakesley
Burkhart,
32,33
Victor Buza,
14
Karen Byrum,
13
Erminia Calabrese,
34
Victoria Calafut,
19
Robert Caldwell,
35
John E. Carlstrom,
16
Julien Carron,
36
Thomas Cecil,
13
Anthony
Challinor,
37
Clarence L. Chang,
13
Yuji Chinone,
7
Hsiao-Mei Sherry Cho,
4
Asantha
Cooray,
1
Thomas M. Crawford,
16
Abigail Crites,
18
Ari Cukierman,
4
Francis-Yan Cyr-
Racine,
14
Tijmen de Haan,
8
Gianfranco de Zotti,
26
Jacques Delabrouille,
17
Marcel
Demarteau,
13
Mark Devlin,
20
Eleonora Di Valentino,
30
Matt Dobbs,
38
Shannon Duff,
39
Adriaan Duivenvoorden,
40
Cora Dvorkin,
14
William Edwards,
8
Joseph Eimer,
2
Josquin
Errard,
17
Thomas Essinger-Hileman,
41
Giulio Fabbian,
36
Chang Feng,
3
Simone Ferraro,
8
Jeffrey P. Filippini,
3
Raphael Flauger,
11
Brenna Flaugher,
10
Aurelien A. Fraisse,
42
An-
drei Frolov,
43
Nicholas Galitzki,
11
Silvia Galli,
29
Ken Ganga,
17
Martina Gerbino,
13
Mur-
dock Gilchriese,
8
Vera Gluscevic,
44
Daniel Green,
11
Daniel Grin,
45
Evan Grohs,
7
Riccardo
Gualtieri,
3
Victor Guarino,
13
Jon E. Gudmundsson,
40
Salman Habib,
13
Gunther Haller,
4
Mark Halpern,
46
Nils W. Halverson,
47
Shaul Hanany,
48
Kathleen Harrington,
49
Masaya
Hasegawa,
50
Matthew Hasselfield,
51
Masashi Hazumi,
50
Katrin Heitmann,
13
Shawn
Henderson,
4
Jason W. Henning,
16
J. Colin Hill,
52
Ren
́
ee Hlo
ˇ
zek,
53
Gil Holder,
3
William
Holzapfel,
7
Johannes Hubmayr,
39
Kevin M. Huffenberger,
54
Michael Huffer,
4
Howard
Hui,
18
Kent Irwin,
5
Bradley R. Johnson,
55
Doug Johnstone,
56,57
William C. Jones,
42
Kirit
Karkare,
16
Nobuhiko Katayama,
58
James Kerby,
13
Sarah Kernovsky,
59
Reijo Keskitalo,
8,7
Theodore Kisner,
8,7
Lloyd Knox,
60
Arthur Kosowsky,
61
John Kovac,
14
Ely D. Kovetz,
2
Steve Kuhlmann,
13
Chao-lin Kuo,
5
Nadine Kurita,
4
Akito Kusaka,
8
Anne Lahteenmaki,
62
Charles R. Lawrence,
63
Adrian T. Lee,
7,8
Antony Lewis,
36
Dale Li,
4
Eric Linder,
8
Mar-
ilena Loverde,
64
Amy Lowitz,
16
Mathew S. Madhavacheril,
42
Adam Mantz,
5
Fred-
erick Matsuda,
65
Philip Mauskopf,
31
Jeff McMahon,
49
P. Daniel Meerburg,
66
Jean-
Baptiste Melin,
67
Joel Meyers,
68
Marius Millea,
69
Joseph Mohr,
25
Lorenzo Moncelsi,
18
Tony Mroczkowski,
70
Suvodip Mukherjee,
29
Moritz M
̈
unchmeyer,
71
Daisuke Nagai,
22
Jo-
hanna Nagy,
72,53
Toshiya Namikawa,
73
Federico Nati,
74
Tyler Natoli,
72
Mattia Negrello,
34
Laura Newburgh,
22
Michael D. Niemack,
19
Haruki Nishino,
50
Martin Nordby,
4
Valentine
Novosad,
13
Paul O’Connor,
75
Georges Obied,
14
Stephen Padin,
16
Shivam Pandey,
20
Bruce
Partridge,
45
Elena Pierpaoli,
44
Levon Pogosian,
43
Clement Pryke,
48
Giuseppe Puglisi,
5
Benjamin Racine,
14
Srinivasan Raghunathan,
76
Alexandra Rahlin,
10
Srini Rajagopalan,
75
Marco Raveri,
16
Mark Reichanadter,
4
Christian L. Reichardt,
77
Mathieu Remazeilles,
30
Graca Rocha,
63
Natalie A. Roe,
8
Anirban Roy,
12
John Ruhl,
78
Maria Salatino,
17
Ben-
jamin Saliwanchik,
22
Emmanuel Schaan,
8
Alessandro Schillaci,
18
Marcel M. Schmittfull,
52
i
arXiv:1908.01062v1 [astro-ph.IM] 31 Jul 2019
Douglas Scott,
46
Neelima Sehgal,
64
Sarah Shandera,
51
Christopher Sheehy,
75
Blake D.
Sherwin,
79
Erik Shirokoff,
16
Sara M. Simon,
49
An
ˇ
ze Slosar,
75
Rachel Somerville,
32,33
Suzanne T. Staggs,
42
Antony Stark,
14
Radek Stompor,
17
Kyle T. Story,
80
Chris Stoughton,
10
Aritoki Suzuki,
8
Osamu Tajima,
81
Grant P. Teply,
11
Keith Thompson,
5
Peter Timbie,
82
Mau-
rizio Tomasi,
83
Jesse I. Treu,
42
Matthieu Tristram,
84
Gregory Tucker,
85
Caterina Umilt,
23
Alexander van Engelen,
28
Joaquin D. Vieira,
3
Abigail G. Vieregg,
16
Mark Vogelsberger,
86
Gensheng Wang,
13
Scott Watson,
87
Martin White,
8,7
Nathan Whitehorn,
76
Edward J.
Wollack,
41
W. L. Kimmy Wu,
16
Zhilei Xu,
20
Siavash Yasini,
44
James Yeck,
82
Ki Won Yoon,
5
Edward Young,
4
Andrea Zonca
11
1
UC Irvine
2
Johns Hopkins University
3
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
4
SLAC
5
Stanford University
6
Oxford University
7
UC Berkeley
8
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
9
Rice University
10
Fermilab
11
UC San Diego
12
SISSA
13
Argonne National Laboratory
14
Harvard University
15
University of New Mexico
16
University of Chicago
17
AstroParticle & Cosmology Laboratory
18
Caltech
19
Cornell University
20
University of Pennsylvania
21
Center for Astrophysics, Harvard & Smithsonian
22
Yale University
23
University of Cincinnati
24
California Institute of Technology
25
LMU Munich
26
INAF
27
Italian ALMA Regional Centre
28
CITA
29
Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris
30
University of Manchester
31
Arizona State University
32
Center for Computational Astrophysics, Flatiron Institute
33
Rutgers University
34
Cardiff University
35
Dartmouth College
36
University of Sussex
37
Institute of Astronomy and DAMTP, University of Cambridge
38
McGill University
39
NIST
40
Stockholm University
41
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
42
Princeton University
43
Simon Fraser University
44
University of Southern California
45
Haverford College
46
University of British Columbia
47
University of Colorado Boulder
48
University of Minnesota
49
University of Michigan
50
KEK
51
Pennsylvania State University
52
Institute for Advanced Study
53
University of Toronto
54
Florida State University
55
Columbia University
56
National Research Council Canada
57
University of Victoria
58
Kavli IPMU
59
FitBit
60
UC Davis
61
University of Pittsburgh
62
Aalto University
63
JPL
64
Stony Brook University
65
University of Tokyo
66
University of Groningen
67
CEA Saclay
68
Southern Methodist University
69
Institut Lagrange de Paris
70
European Southern Observatory
71
Perimeter Institute
72
Dunlap Institute
73
National Taiwan University
74
University of Milano-Bicocca
75
Brookhaven National Laboratory
76
UCLA
77
University of Melbourne
78
Case Western Reserve University
79
University of Cambridge
80
Descartes Lab
81
Kyoto University
82
University of Wisconsin–Madison
83
Universit degli Studi di Milan
84
LAL
85
Brown University
86
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
87
Syracuse University
ii
CMB-S4 Overview and Context
CMB-S4 is envisioned to be the ultimate ground-based cosmic microwave background ex-
periment, crossing critical thresholds in our understanding of the origin and evolution of
the Universe, from the highest energies at the dawn of time through the growth of struc-
ture to the present day. The CMB-S4 science case is spectacular: the search for primordial
gravitational waves as predicted from inflation and the imprint of relic particles including
neutrinos, unique insights into dark energy and tests of gravity on large scales, elucidat-
ing the role of baryonic feedback on galaxy formation and evolution, opening up a win-
dow on the transient Universe at millimeter wavelengths, and even the exploration of the
outer Solar System. The CMB-S4 sensitivity to primordial gravitational waves will probe
physics at the highest energy scales and cross a major theoretically motivated threshold
in constraints on inflation. The CMB-S4 search for new light relic particles will shed light
on the early Universe 10,000 times farther back than current experiments can reach. Fi-
nally, the CMB-S4 Legacy Survey covering 70% of the sky with unprecedented sensitivity
and angular resolution from centimeter- to millimeter-wave observing bands will have
a profound and lasting impact on Astronomy and Astrophysics and provide a powerful
complement to surveys at other wavelengths, such as LSST and WFIRST, and others yet
to be imagined. We emphasize that these critical thresholds cannot be reached without
the level of community and agency investment and commitment required by CMB-S4.
In particular, the CMB-S4 science goals are out of the reach of any projected precursor
experiment by a significant margin.
CMB-S4 is planned to be a joint NSF and DOE project, with the construction phase to be
funded as an NSF MREFC project and a DOE HEP MIE project. An interim project office
has been constituted and tasked with advancing the CMB-S4 project in the NSF MREFC
Preliminary Design Phase and toward DOE Critical Decision CD-1. Support for the office
is being provided in part by DOE, and a funding proposal to the NSF MSRI-R1 program is
pending. DOE CD-0 is expected imminently and will be a major milestone for the project.
CMB-S4 was recommended by the 2014 Particle Physics Project Prioritization Panel (P5)
report
Building for Discovery: Strategic Plan for U.S. Particle Physics in the Global Context
and
by the 2015 National Academies report
A Strategic Vision for NSF Investments in Antarctic
and Southern Ocean Research
. The community further developed the science case in the
2016
CMB-S4 Science Book
[1] and surveyed the status of the technology in the 2017
CMB-
S4 Technology Book
[2]. This work formed the foundation for the joint NSF-DOE Concept
Definition Task Force (CDT), a subpanel of the Astronomy and Astrophysics Advisory
Committee (AAAC), a FACA committee advising DOE, NASA, and NSF. The CDT report
was enthusiastically accepted by the AAAC in October 2017.
Building on the CDT report, the CMB-S4 Collaboration and the pre-Project Development
Group composed of experienced project leaders drawn primarily from the national labo-
ratories have produced the comprehensive document,
The CMB-S4 Science Case, Reference
Design, and Project Plan
[3], which we refer to here as the Decadal Survey Report (DSR).
The material presented in this white paper has been extracted from the DSR, and we
encourage the reader to see the DSR for more detail. It and numerous other reports, col-
1
laboration bylaws, workshop and working group wiki pages, email lists, and much more
may be found at the website
http://CMB-S4.org
.
To achieve its transformational science goals, CMB-S4 requires an enormous increase
in sensitivity over all current CMB experiments combined, and roughly an order-of-
magnitude increase over any projected precursor experiment. A significant and unique
feature of CMB-S4 from the outset has been the use of multiple sites, specifically combin-
ing the two best currently developed sites on Earth for millimeter-wave observing: the
high Atacama Plateau in Chile and the geographical South Pole. The design of CMB-S4
exploits key features of the two sites, namely the ability to drill deep on a single small
patch of the sky through an extraordinarily stable atmosphere from the South Pole, and
the ability to survey up to 80% of the sky from the exceptionally high and dry Atacama
site.
Current experimental efforts at these two sites are already being consolidated into two
major precursor observatories to CMB-S4, the Simons Observatory (SO) and the South
Pole Observatory (SPO), whose teams also make up the vast majority of the CMB-S4
collaboration. The timing of both of these observatories is well-aligned with CMB-S4,
enabling them to act as valuable pathfinders for CMB-S4 by providing technical and sci-
entific data that have informed and will continue to inform our design and operations.
To this end, both have also provided Letters of Intent to share their technical and cost
data with CMB-S4. Nonetheless, while both will make significant advances in key CMB
science goals, they will still fall well short of the thresholds targeted by CMB-S4. For ex-
ample, to match the sensitivity to primordial gravitational waves provided by the ultra-
deep CMB-S4 survey, SPO would have to integrate for nearly 50 years; it would take SO
a similar amount of time to match the sensitivity to light relics provided by the CMB-S4
deep and wide survey.
From space, the LiteBIRD CMB satellite mission was recently selected by JAXA for launch
in 2028 for a 3-year mission, concurrent with CMB-S4 operations. With its lower resolu-
tion but wider frequency coverage, LiteBIRD’s science goals are distinct from but highly
complementary to CMB-S4’s, and we are already discussing the parameters of a possible
Memorandum of Understanding to enable both experiments to enhance their reach using
elements of the other’s data.
In short, CMB-S4 will enable transformational science that cannot be achieved otherwise,
the CMB-S4 concept has clear community and agency support, and the CMB-S4 collab-
oration and project are moving forward. CMB-S4 thus represents a unique and timely
scientific opportunity.
Key Science Goals and Objectives
We have organized the rich and diverse set of CMB-S4 scientific goals into four themes:
1.
primordial gravitational waves and inflation
;
2.
the dark Universe
;
2
3.
mapping matter in the cosmos
;
4.
the time-variable millimeter-wave sky
.
The first two science themes relate to fundamental physics. The other two themes relate
to the broader scientific opportunities made possible by a millimeter-wave survey of un-
precedented depth and breadth. Here we briefly review the key high-level goals and refer
the reader to the science case detailed in the DSR and in the decadal survey science white
papers referenced.
Primordial gravitational waves and inflation.
We have a historic opportunity to open
up a window to the primordial Universe [4]. If the predictions of some of the leading
models for the origin of the hot big bang are borne out, CMB-S4 will detect the signature
of primordial gravitational waves in the polarization pattern of the CMB. This detection
would provide the first evidence for the quantization of gravity, reveal new physics at the
energy scale of grand unified theories, and yield insight into the symmetries of nature.
The current leading scenario for the origin of structure in our Universe is cosmic inflation,
a period of accelerated expansion prior to the hot big bang. During this epoch, quan-
tum fluctuations were imprinted on all spatial scales in the Universe. These fluctuations
seeded the density perturbations that developed into all the structure in the Universe to-
day. While there are still viable alternative models for the early history of the Universe,
the simplest models of inflation are exceptionally successful in describing the data.
Tantalizingly, the observed scale dependence of the amplitude of density perturbations
has quantitative implications for the amplitude of primordial gravitational waves, com-
monly parameterized by
r
, the ratio of fluctuation power in gravitational waves to that in
density perturbations. All inflation models that naturally explain the observed deviation
from scale invariance and that also have a characteristic scale equal to or larger than the
gravitational mass scale predict
r
&
0
.
001
. A well-motivated sub-class within this set of
models is detectable by CMB-S4 at 5
σ
. The observed departure from scale invariance is
a potentially important clue that strongly motivates exploring down to
r
= 10
−
3
. With
an order of magnitude more detectors than precursor observations, and exquisite control
of systematic errors, CMB-S4 will improve upon limits from pre-CMB-S4 observations by
a factor of five to reach this target, allowing us to either detect primordial gravitational
waves or rule out large classes of inflationary models and dramatically impact how we
think about the theory.
The dark Universe.
In the standard cosmological model, about 95% of the energy den-
sity of the Universe is in dark matter and dark energy. With CMB-S4 we can address
numerous questions about these dark ingredients, such as: How is matter distributed on
large scales? Does the dark matter have non-gravitational interactions with baryons? Are
there additional unseen components beyond dark matter and dark energy?
Light relic particles are one very well-motivated possibility for additional energy density,
as additional light particles appear frequently and numerously in extensions to the stan-
dard model of particle physics [5]. For large regions of the unexplored parameter space in
3
these models, the light particles are thermalized in the early Universe. The Planck satel-
lite has sensitivity to light particles that fell out of thermal equilibrium in the first
'
50
micro-seconds of the Universe. With CMB-S4 we can push back this frontier by over a
factor of 10,000, to the first fractions of a nanosecond.
The contribution of light relics to the energy density, often parameterized as the “effec-
tive number of neutrino species,”
N
eff
, leads to observable consequences in the CMB tem-
perature and polarization anisotropy. Current data are only sensitive enough to detect
additional relics that froze out after the quark-hadron transition, so CMB-S4’s ability to
probe times well before that transition is a major advance. Specifically CMB-S4 will con-
strain
∆
N
eff
<
0
.
06
at 95% C.L., achieving sensitivity to Weyl fermion and vector particles
that froze out at temperatures a few hundred times higher than that of the QCD phase
transition.
CMB-S4 will also enable a broader exploration of the dark Universe in combination with
other probes, often significantly enhancing them by breaking their intrinsic degeneracies.
It will improve or detect various possibilities for the dark matter properties beyond the
simplest cold dark matter models [6]. It will add to dark energy constraints through preci-
sion measurements of the primordial power spectrum, through precision measurements
of the lensing convergence power spectrum, through the CMB-lensing-derived mass cal-
ibration of galaxy clusters [7], and through CMB lensing tomography [8].
Mapping matter in the cosmos.
Observations indicate there is roughly five times more
dark matter than baryonic matter and that most of the baryonic matter is in the form of
hot ionized gas rather than cold gas or stars. CMB-S4 will be able to map out normal
and dark matter separately by measuring the fluctuations in the total mass density (using
gravitational lensing) and the ionized gas density (using Compton scattering).
Observations of gravitational lensing of the CMB are key to many CMB-S4 science goals.
CMB-S4 lensing data will lead to a precise two-dimensional map of the total matter dis-
tribution. The statistical properties of this mass map will provide important constraints
on dark energy [8], modified gravity [8], and the neutrino masses [9]. When combined
with CMB-S4-derived or external catalogs of galaxies or galaxy clusters, this mass map
can be used to “weigh” the galaxy or cluster samples. With galaxies, this can be done in
a redshift-dependent or tomographic manner out to redshifts as high as
z
∼
5
, making
possible new precision tests of cosmology and gravity. With robust CMB-lensing-based
cluster masses at high redshift, the abundance of galaxy clusters can be used as an addi-
tional probe of dark energy and neutrino masses.
Most of the baryons in the late Universe are believed to be in a diffuse ionized plasma that
is difficult to observe [10, 11, 12]. CMB-S4 will measure the effect of Compton scattering
by this gas (the Sunyaev-Zeldovich or SZ effects), both the spectral distortion from hot
electrons (thermal SZ or tSZ) and a general redshift or blueshift of the scattered photons
due to coherent bulk flows along the line of sight (kinematic SZ or kSZ). The nature of
the scattering makes the SZ effects independent of redshift. With a deep and wide sur-
vey covering a large amount of volume and an ultra-deep survey imaging lower-mass
4
clusters, CMB-S4 will be an effective probe of the crucial regime of
z
&
2
, when galaxy
clusters were vigorously accreting new hot gas while at the same time forming the bulk
of their stars [13]. The CMB-S4 catalog will contain an order of magnitude more clusters
at
z >
2
than will be discovered with Stage 3 CMB experiments [7, 14]. CMB-S4 will also
measure the diffuse tSZ signal everywhere on the sky and make a temperature-weighted
map of ionized gas that can be used to measure the average thermal pressure profiles
around galaxies and groups of galaxies. CMB-S4 will make maps of the kSZ effect, which
will be combined with data from other surveys to make maps of the projected electron
density around samples of objects. Applications of these maps include measuring ion-
ized gas as a function of radius, directly constraining the impact of feedback from active
galactic nuclei and supernovae on the intergalactic medium [15] and constraining theo-
ries of modified gravity with the bulk flow amplitude as a function of separation. Even
without overlapping galaxy catalogs, the kSZ signal can be used to probe the epoch of
reionization, in ways that are highly complementary to the measurements of the neutral
gas that can be obtained with redshifted Ly-
α
and 21-cm studies [16, 17, 18, 19].
The time-variable millimeter-wave sky.
There have been relatively few studies of the
variable sky at millimeter wavelengths, with only one systematic survey done to date
(by a CMB experiment [20]). A deep, wide, millimeter-wave survey with time-domain
capability will provide key insights into transient or burst events, moving sources such
as Solar-System objects, and variable sources such as AGN.
Targeted follow-up observations of gamma-ray bursts, core-collapse supernovae, tidal
disruption events, classical novae, X-ray binaries, and stellar flares have found that there
are many transient events with measured fluxes that would make them detectable by
CMB-S4. A systematic survey of the mm-wave sky with a cadence of a day or two over a
large fraction of the sky, combined with an ultra-deep daily survey of a few percent of the
sky, would be an excellent complement to other transient surveys, filling a gap between
radio and optical searches [20]. Gamma-ray burst afterglows are particular interesting
targets as they peak at millimeter wavelengths and there is a possibility of capturing mm-
wave afterglows that have no corresponding gamma-ray trigger, either from the geometry
of relativistic beaming and/or from sources at very high redshift [20]. Both are predicted
theoretically but have never been detected.
Thermal emission from planets, dwarf planets, and a selection of asteroids has been mea-
sured at these wavelengths; since these sources move across the sky they can be differen-
tiated from the stationary extrasolar sky. CMB-S4 will provide a long well-sampled time
baseline and a wavelength range that is well-suited for the detection of possible large
objects in the outer Solar System. These measurements will be highly complementary to
those using optical reflected light or thermal emission at infrared wavelengths.
CMB-S4 will play an active role in multi-messenger astronomy, providing a long base-
line with high-cadence sampling in both intensity and linear polarization over a wide
sky area. For example, the IceCube event IC170922A is believed to be associated with
a flaring gamma-ray state of the blazar TXS 0506+056. In December 2014, however, the
same source appears to have had a neutrino luminosity at least 10 times larger with no
5
associated gamma emission—and no data existed at other wavelengths. Having high-
cadence wide-field non-gamma-ray data will be critical to understand sources like this
one. Any similar source is likely to be included in CMB-S4’s near-daily, high-signal-to-
noise monitoring of the blazar population. The wide-area nature of the survey will also
make it straightforward to search for gravitational wave sources, particularly for sources
that happen to be poorly localized and are challenging for other instruments.
Technical Overview
The CMB-S4 collaboration and project have developed a Reference Design that meets the
measurement requirements and therefore can deliver the CMB-S4 science goals. The main
components of the Reference Design are described in detail in the DSR and summarized
here. The major components of the Reference Design are as follows:
•
An ultra-deep survey covering 3% of the sky, more if a gravitational-wave sig-
nal is detected, to be conducted over seven years using: fourteen 0.55-m refrac-
tor small-aperture telescopes (SATs) at 155 GHz and below and four 0.44-m SATs at
220/270 GHz, with dichroic, horn-coupled superconducting transition-edge-sensor
(TES) detectors in each SAT, measuring two of the eight targeted frequency bands
between 30 and 270 GHz; and one 6-m class “delensing” large-aperture telescope
(LAT), equipped with detectors distributed over seven bands from 20 to 278 GHz.
Measurements at degree angular scales and larger made using refractor telescopes
with roughly 0.5-m apertures have been demonstrated to deliver high-fidelity, low-
contamination polarization measurements at these scales. The combination of the
SATs with the 6-m LAT therefore provides low-resolution
B
-mode measurements
with excellent control of systematic contamination, as well as the high-resolution
measurements required for delensing. The ultra-deep survey SATs and 6-m LAT
are to be located at the South Pole to allow targeted observations of the single small-
area field, with provisions to relocate a fraction of the SATs in Chile if, for example,
a high level of
r
is detected or unforeseen systematic issues are encountered.
The total detector count for the 18 SATs is 153,232, with the majority of the detectors
allocated to the 85 to 155 GHz bands. The total number of science-grade 150-mm
detector wafers required for 18 SATs is 204. The delensing LAT will have a total
TES detector count of 114,432, with the majority of the detectors allocated to the 95
to 150 GHz bands. The total number of science-grade 150-mm diameter detector
wafers required for this single LAT is 76.
•
A deep and wide survey covering approximately 70% of the sky to be conducted
over seven years using two 6-m LATs located in Chile, each equipped with 121,760
TES detectors distributed over eight frequency bands spanning 30 to 278 GHz. The
total number of science-grade 150-mm diameter detector wafers required for these
two LATs is 152.
In the context of their legacy value to the wider community, we refer to the deep/wide
6
and ultra-deep high-resolution surveys together as the CMB-S4 Legacy Survey. The to-
tal detector count for CMB-S4 is 511,184, requiring 432 science grade wafers. This is an
enormous increase over the detector count of all Stage-3 experiments combined. Such a
dramatic increase in scale is required to meet the CMB-S4 science goals.
Technical Drivers
The CMB-S4 reference design uses existing, well-demonstrated technology that has been
developed and demonstrated by the CMB experimental groups over the last decade,
scaled up to unprecedented levels. The design and implementation plan addresses the
considerable technical challenges presented by the required scaling up of the instrumen-
tation and by the scope and complexity of the data analysis and interpretation. Features
of the design and plan include: scaled-up superconducting detector arrays with well-
understood and robust material properties and processing techniques; high-throughput
mm-wave telescopes and optics with unprecedented precision and rejection of system-
atic contamination; full internal characterization of astronomical foreground emission;
large cosmological simulations and improved theoretical modeling; and computational
methods for extracting minute correlations in massive, multi-frequency data sets, which
include noise and a host of known and unknown signals.
A CMB-S4 Risk and Opportunity Management Plan describes the continuous risk and
opportunity management process implemented by the project, consistent with DOE
O413.3B, Project Management for the Acquisition of Capital Assets, and the NSF 17-
066, NSF Large Facilities Manual. The plan establishes the methods of assessing CMB-S4
project risk and opportunities for all subsystems as well as the system as a whole. The
CMB-S4 risk register has 213 risks identified. There are three risks that are currently as-
sessed at Critical and 26 risks at High. The project is working on mitigations to ensure
that these risks are lowered to reasonable levels on a timescale consistent with our overall
project timeline.
For example, a current identified critical risk is meeting the scaled-up production and
testing timeline of the transition-edge-sensor detector arrays. This is a major focus of
the R&D program supported by the DOE. The Interim Project Office formed a Detector
and Readout (D&R) Task Force in early 2019 to evaluate existing fabrication and testing
capabilities and to provide recommendations on production plans. A formal review of
the resulting detector fabrication plan will be completed in mid-2019.
Organization, Partnerships, and Current Status
CMB-S4 is both a scientific collaboration and a nascent DOE/NSF project. While these
are certainly tightly coupled, they do have different roles and responsibilities; the overall
organization of CMB-S4 therefore decouples into the organization of the collaboration
and the project.
The formal CMB-S4 collaboration was established in 2018 with the ratification of the by-
7
laws and election of the various officers including the collaboration Governing Board. As
of summer 2019 the collaboration has 198 members, 71 of whom hold positions within
the organizational structure. These members represent 11 countries on 4 continents, and
76 institutions comprising 16 national laboratories and 60 universities.
The CMB-S4 Collaboration and a pre-Project Development Group of experienced project
leaders drawn largely from the national labs, jointly contributed to the development of
the project Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), Organization, Cost Book, Resource Loaded
Schedule, and Risk Registry. The top level WBS Structure and Cost is summarized in
Table 1. The schedule has 1110 activities, 1928 relationships, 5 Level 1, 20 Level 2 and 299
Level 3 Milestones for the CMB-S4 project.
The reference design and project baseline summarized here and detailed in the DSR is
the basis for subsequent design and project development work to be led by the Interim
Project Office (see Fig. 1) and the Collaboration. A permanent Integrated Project Office
will be established in 2020 to manage the construction phase which is anticipated to start
in 2021.
Table 1: CMB-S4 WBS Structure and Cost
WBS Level 2 Element
$M
Total Estimated Cost (TEC)
1.01 – Project Management
19.6
1.03 – Detectors
39.5
1.04 – Readout
59.9
1.05 – Module Assembly & Testing
31.8
1.06 – Large Aperture Telescopes
86.5
1.07 – Small Aperture Telescopes
52.3
1.08 – Observation Control & Data Acquisition
13.9
1.09 – Data Management
26.9
1.10 – Chile Infrastructure
38.1
1.11 – South Pole Infrastructure
37.0
1.12 – Integration & Commissioning
7.7
Direct TEC
413.2
TEC Contingency (35%)
144.6
Total TEC
557.9
Other Project Cost (OPC)
1.01 – Project Management
7.0
1.02 – Research & Development
24.2
Direct OPC
31.2
OPC Contingency (35%) - excludes R&D
2.5
Total OPC
33.7
Total Project Cost (TPC)
TEC + OPC with contingency
591.6
As shown in Fig. 1, a key feature of
the organization is the role of collab-
oration members in the project office,
in particular as leaders of the Level 2
systems.
The Level 2 managers are
supported by engineering and project-
management leaders. The NSF/DOE
scope distribution will promote the en-
gagement and participation of univer-
sities and national laboratories. Grad-
uate students, postdocs, professional
technicians and engineers are expected
to be involved in all aspects of the
project.
The project office is responsible for
forming partnerships with key stake-
holder institutions, including DOE Na-
tional Laboratories, universities, and
potential collaborating projects such
as the Simons Observatory, South
Pole Observatory, and the CCAT-prime
project. Partnerships are also expected
to include foreign institutions participating in the CMB-S4 Science Collaboration and con-
tributing to the CMB-S4 Project.
The CMB-S4 project is expected to include significant contributions from collaborating
institutions supported by funding agencies other than NSF and DOE. These “in-kind”
contributions will be defined as deliverables to the project. Major contributions from
8
~200 Members
76 Institutions
11 Countries
Interim
Project Director
Jim Yeck
Integrated Project
Steering Committee:
ANL, BNL, FNAL, LBNL, SLAC
AUI, U Chicago,
Other Partners
MODULE
ASSEMBLY &
TESTING
Brad Benson
(FNAL/Chicago)
READOUT
Zeesh Ahmed
(SLAC)
Amy Bender
(ANL)
LARGE APERTURE
TELESCOPES
Mike Niemack
(Cornell)
Steve Padin
(U Chicago/ANL)
CHILE
INFRASTRUCTURE
Kam Arnold
(UCSD)
SMALL APERTURE
TELESCOPES
John Kovac
(Harvard)
Akito Kusaka
(LBNL/U Tokyo)
SOUTH POLE
INFRASTRUCTURE
John Ruhl
(CWRU)
DETECTORS
Clarence Chang
(ANL/Chicago)
Kent Irwin
(SLAC/Stanford)
Aritoki Suzuki
(LBNL)
DATA ACQUISITION
& CONTROL
Laura Newburgh
(Yale)
Nathan Whitehorn
(UCLA)
DATA
MANAGEMENT
Julian Borrill
(LBNL/UC Berkeley)
Tom Crawford
(U Chicago)
DOE
High Energy
Physics
NSF
Astronomy
Physics
Polar Programs
DOE/NSF
Joint Coordination
Group
Spokespeople
Julian Borrill (LBNL/UC Berkeley) & John Carlstrom (U Chicago/ANL)
Technical Coordinators
Je
ff
McMahon (U Michigan) & Abby Vieregg (U Chicago)
INTEGRATION &
COMMISSIONING
Kam Arnold
(UCSD)
John Ruhl
(CWRU)
COLLABORATION
PROJECT OFFICE
Project Manager - R&D/C&S: Brenna Flaugher (FNAL)
Project Manager - D&R: Mark Reichanadter (SLAC-Rtd)
Technical Baseline Development:
Dan Akerib (SLAC/Stanford), Gil Gilchriese (LBNL), Steve Padin (U Chicago/ANL)
Project Systems & Controls: Kathy Bailey (ANL)
Systems Engineering Management: Nadine Kurita (SLAC)
Education & Public Outreach
Other
Partners
Senior Team Leads
Figure 1: Organizational Chart of the Interim Project Office. The figure includes a notional distribution of
project scope by funding agency (NSF = blue, DOE = green, Other = yellow). We are actively pursuing
partners who could make significant scope contributions in areas aligned with their expertise.
partners will need to be negotiated and incorporated in the project design within the next
two to three years to avoid adding schedule and cost risk.
Schedule
Table 2 shows the proposed timeline via the NSF Level 1 Milestones along with the cor-
responding DOE Critical Decision Milestones. The schedule development strategy is to
define a schedule that is consistent with the funding potentially available during FY2019-
FY2021 and is subsequently technically driven. The project is working towards an early
completion milestone that contains limited schedule float. A year of schedule float fol-
lowing this early project complete milestone is included in the overall project complete
milestone CD-4. The Interim Project Office will continue to optimize the schedule and
include explicit float for activities that are not on the critical path. The best opportunity
to improve on the schedule is to reduce the time required to deliver the full quantity of
the Detectors and Readout (D&R) components.
Seven years of operations are needed to achieve the CMB-S4 science goals.
Table 2: Timeline and Funding Agency Milestones
NSF Level 1 Milestone (DOE Critical Decision)
Schedule (FY)
Pre-Conceptual Design (CD-0, Mission Need)
Q3 2019
Preliminary Baseline (CD-1/3a, Cost Range/Long-Lead Procurement)
Q3 2021
Preliminary Design Review (CD-2, Performance Baseline)
Q2 2022
Final Deign Review (CD-3, Start of Construction)
Q4 2023
Completion of 1st Telescope (CD-4a, Initial Operations)
Q2 2026
Project Completion(CD-4, Operations)
Q1 2029
9
Cost Estimates
The CMB-S4 project total estimated cost is currently $591.6M (fully loaded and escalated
to the year of expenditure) including a 35% contingency budget. The breakdown of the
costs by major components of the construction phase is shown in Table 1. The cost esti-
mate is the full cost, i.e., it does not take credit for use of any legacy infrastructure or for
contributions from collaborating institutions supported by private and international part-
ners, e.g., large-aperture telescopes currently under construction in Chile as part of the
Simons Observatory, or large- and small-aperture telescopes proposed by international
collaborators. In-kind contributions delivered by private and international partners are
expected and would reduce the total cost to NSF and DOE. It is estimated that the value
of in-kind contributions could reduce the total cost of the CMB-S4 project by 20-25%.
The total estimated cost is built on detailed cost estimates made for each task in the project
schedule. The estimates are documented with a Basis of Estimate (BOE) developed by the
subsystems leads. The task resources and their quantities are assigned from a standard-
ized list of resources. The list includes multiple resource classes in each of the categories:
labor, materials/non-labor, or travel. A task estimate consists of the number of hours of
each labor resource class, the base-year dollar cost of each materials/non-labor resource
class, the number of trips for each travel resource class, and the basis for each estimate.
The cost contingency estimate was constructed using input from experts with experience
in previous CMB experiments and similar NSF MREFC projects and DOE MIE projects.
As the design, cost estimates, and schedules mature the contingency as a percentage of
the base cost estimate is expected to decrease to 30% or less. The target range for the start
of the CMB-S4 construction project is 25-30%. A notional distribution of project scope by
funding agency is shown in Fig. 1, where blue indicates NSF and green DOE. The level
of the NSF and DOE costs are expected to be comparable, with the notional distribution
having NSF and DOE contributing 42% and 58% of the funding, respectively.
The basic operations model for CMB-S4 will be observations with multiple telescopes
and cameras distributed across two sites, with observing priorities and specifications op-
timized for the CMB-S4 science goals, and data from all instruments shared throughout
the entire CMB-S4 collaboration. The operations cost is based on a preliminary bottom-
up estimate that includes management, site staff, utilities, instrument maintenance, data
transmission, data products, pipeline upgrades, collaboration management, and key sci-
ence analysis. The annual operations cost is $32M in 2019 dollars, excluding 20 FTE/year
of scientist effort supported by DOE research funds, with roughly 60% allocated to opera-
tions and 40% allocated to analysis of the key CMB-S4 science goals. The non-key science
analysis of CMB-S4 data products will be carried out by laboratory and university sci-
entists, with support for the latter expected to be provided by individual NSF and DOE
awards.
Normal end-of-life decommissioning costs for South Pole and Chile infrastructure are
anticipated.
10
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12