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Speaker: Denis Barkats  (ESO-ALMA)

Abstract: 

BICEP2 recently reported a detection of B-modes in the CMB polarization at degree angular scales. This B-mode pattern is widely interpreted 
as the likely signature from primordial gravitational waves, consistent with those predicted to arise in the first 10^-34 seconds of the history of 
the universe, stretched from quantum to classical scales by the exponential expansion of cosmic inflation. BICEP2 is a CMB polarimeter that 
was specifically designed to search for the elusive signal from inflationary gravitational waves in the B-mode power spectra around l = 80. BICEP2 
has accumulated 3 years of data from the South Pole from 2010 to 2012, integrating continuously on a low-foreground region of effective size 1% 
of the whole sky. I will describe the experimental strategy, tests for foreground and systematics contamination, and results in the map and power spectra.