What's New in 2020

2020

December 18–January 7

Urlaub. Kein Lapton, keine E-mail!

December 16

(on-line) Perspektivenkommission

December 9–11

Remote participation to the NCTS Annual Theory Meeting 2020, National Center for Theoretical Sciences, Taiwan

November 26

(on-line) Seminar on “Hunting for Parity-violating Physics in Polarisation of the Cosmic Microwave Background”, Central European Institute for Cosmology and Fundamental Physics (CEICO), Prague [16:00-17:00]

Abstract: Polarised light of the cosmic microwave background, the remnant light of the Big Bang, is sensitive to parity-violating physics. In this presentation we report on a new measurement of parity violation from polarisation data of the European Space Agency (ESA)’s Planck satellite. The statistical significance of the measured signal is 2.4 sigma. If confirmed with higher statistical significance in future, it would have important implications for the elusive nature of dark matter and dark energy.

November 23

Cosmology Talks on the summary of New Extraction of the Cosmic Birefringence from the Planck 2018 Polarization, hosted by Dr. Shaun Hotchkiss at the University of Auckland

November 20

(on-line) MPI für Gravitationsphysik (AEI) for「第5回ドイツ物理学・応用物理学セミナー」

November 3 – December 3

(on-line) IMPRS course on the “Cosmic Microwave Background” (Every Tuesday and Thursday, 10:00-11:30)

October 29,30

(on-line) Sektionssitzung

October 15

(on-line) Colloquium on “The New Quests for Physics of the Early Universe  at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Heidelberg

  • Abstract: The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) gives a photographic image of the Universe when it was still an “infant”. Its detailed measurements have given us a wealth of information such as the composition and history of the Universe. We are now using it to test our ideas about the origin of the Universe. I will review the physics of CMB and the key results from the recent experiments, and discuss future prospects on our quest to find the cosmic origins.

September 25

(on-line) Public lecture on “The New Quests for Physics of the Early Universe” (video), Summer School on Galaxies and Cosmology 2020, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia

September 24

(on-line) Perspektivenkommission

September 16–18

(on-line) PFS collaboration meeting (15:00-17:00)

September 11

(on-line) Seminar on “Finding Gravitational Waves from the Early Universe” (video), Astrophysical Research Center (ARC), University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

August 31 – September 4

Urlaub. Kein Lapton, keine E-mail!

August 24

天文・天体物理若手夏の学校

July 30

(on-line) Perspektivenkommission

July 17

(on-line) Informal presentation on “Some tips for faculty, grant, and fellowship applications” [Facebook discussion]


Cancelled/postponed/replaced by remote due to COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2):

July 13–17

Dark Side of the Universe” conference at ICTP-EAIFR (East African Institute for Fundamental Research), Kigali, Rwanda. The first time to visit Africa! [Moved to the next year]

June 29–July 3

Lorentz Workshop on “Inflationary Imprints in Large-scale Structure”, Leiden, the Netherlands

June 17

Sektionssitzung, Berlin-Dahlem [Done remotely]

June 5–14

Okayama, Japan

  • 6/5-6: MUC()-HND-ITM()
  • 6/7,8: Takarazuka
  • 6/9: Public talk, Okayama University
  • 6/10-13: LiteBIRD Collaboration Meeting at Okayama University [Done remotely]
  • 6/14: ITM()-HND-MUC()

May 26–29

Panoptic cosmology with high-redshift surveys, Marseille

May 19,20

Editorial Board Meeting of AARv [Done remotely]

May 12

Perspektivenkommission, Berlin-Dahlem [Done remotely]

May 4–7

Universität Göttingen

  • 5/4: München Hbf()-Göttingen Hbf(); Physikalisches Kolloquium on “Critical Tests of Theory of the Early Universe using the Cosmic Microwave Background [16:30-]
  • 5/7: Göttingen Hbf()-München Hbf()

April 28,29

Voyage 2050 Senior Committee Meeting at MPE [Done remotely]

April 20–24

IMPRS course on the “Cosmic Microwave Background

April 6–11

Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

April 1–3

Prague, to visit Central European Institute for Cosmology and Fundamental Physics

  • 4/1: MUC(15:30)-PRG(16:20)
  • 4/2: Give a seminar on “Finding Gravitational Waves from the Early Universe” at 16:00 [50+10]
  • 4/3: PRG(9:40)-MUC(10:30)


February 24–March 21

Amsterdam, as the Van der Waals Professional Chair

February 14–20

Kavli IPMU, Kashiwa, Japan

February 13

Perspektivenkommission, Münich

February 6,7

AEI, Potsdam-Golm

  • 2/6: München Hbf(11:56, Gl.22)-Berlin Hbf(15:51)
  • 2/7: Give a colloquium on “Finding Gravitational Waves from the Early Universe” [14:00-15:00; Q&A from 11:00]
    • AbstractThe cosmic microwave background (CMB) research told us a remarkable story: the structure we see in our Universe such as galaxies, stars, planets, and eventually ourselves originated from tiny quantum fluctuations generated in the early Universe. With the WMAP we have confirmed many of the key predictions of inflation including flatness and statistical homogeneity of our Universe, Gaussianity and adiabaticity of primordial density fluctuations, and a small but non-zero deviation from the scale-invariant spectrum of density fluctuations. Yet, the extraordinary claim requires extraordinary evidence. The last prediction of inflation that is yet to be confirmed is the existence of primordial gravitational waves whose wavelength can be as big as billions of light years. To this end we have proposed to JAXA a new satellite mission called LiteBIRD, whose primary scientific goal is to find signatures of gravitational waves in the polarisation of the CMB. In this presentation we describe physics of gravitational waves from inflation including both the vacuum and sourced contributions (i.e., left and right hands of Einstein's equation), the LiteBIRD proposal, as well as a sub-mm telescope in Chile called CCAT-prime that we are currently building.
  • 2/7: Berlin Hbf(18:05, Gl.1)-München Hbf(22:01)

February 3–5

IMPRS workshop, MPE

January 13–15

Voyage 2050 Topical Team Meeting at ESTEC

  • 1/13: MUC(8:45)-AMS(10:20)
  • 1/15: AMS(19:50)-MUC(21:15)
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