Probing the Dark Ages at Z~20: The SCI-HI 21 cm All-Sky Spectrum Experiment

Tabitha Christine Voytek, Arvind Natarajan, Jose Miguel Jáuregui García, Jeffrey Peterson, Omar López-Cruz
2018
We present first results from the SCI-HI experiment, which we used to measure the all-sky-averaged 21 cm brightness temperature in the redshift range 14.8 < z < 22.7. The instrument consists of a single broadband sub-wavelength size antenna and a sampling system for real-time data processing and recording. Preliminary observations were completed in 2013 June at Isla Guadalupe, a Mexican biosphere reserve located in the Pacific Ocean. The data was cleaned to excise channels contaminated by radio
more » ... frequency interference, and the system response was calibrated by comparing the measured brightness temperature to the Global Sky Model of the Galaxy and by independent measurement of Johnson noise from a calibration terminator. We present our results, discuss the cosmological implications, and describe plans for future work.
doi:10.1184/r1/6507941.v1 fatcat:thhl3nrlenhidfkwj6tb33ykny