A Robust Determination of the Time Delay in 0957+561A, B and a Measurement of the Global Value of Hubble's Constant
Continued photometric monitoring of the gravitational lens system 0957+561A, B in the g and r bands with the Apache Point Observatory (APO) 3.5 m telescope during 1996 shows a sharp g-band event in the trailing (B) image light curve at the precise time predicted in an earlier paper. The prediction was based on the observation of the event during 1995 in the leading (A) image and on a differential time delay of 415 days. This success confirms the so-called short delay, and the absence of any such feature at a delay near 540 days rejects the long delay for this system, thus resolving a long-standing controversy. A series of statistical analyses of our light-curve data yield a best-fit delay of 417 ? 3 days (95% confidence interval) and demonstrate that this result is quite robust against variations in the analysis technique, data subsamples, and assumed parametric relationship of the two light curves. Recent improvements in the modeling of the lens system (consisting of a galaxy plus a galaxy cluster) allow us to derive a value of the global value (at z = 0.36) of Hubble's constant H0 using Refsdal's method, a simple and direct (single-step) distance determination based on experimentally verified and securely understood physics and geometry. The result is H0 = 64 ? 13 km s-1 Mpc-1 (for ? = 1), where this 95% confidence interval is dominantly due to remaining lens model uncertainties. However, it is reassuring that available observations of the lensing mass distribution overconstrain the model and thus provide an internal consistency check on its validity. We argue that this determination of the extragalactic distance scale (10% accurate at 1 ?) is now of comparable quality, in terms of both statistical and systematic uncertainties, to those based on more conventional techniques. Finally, we briefly discuss the prospects for improved H0 determinations using gravitational lenses, and some other possible implications and uses of the 0957+561A, B light curves.

title: Dark Energy Search with Supernovae
abstract: To determine the nature of dark energy from observational data, it is important that we use model-independent and optimal methods. We should probe dark energy using its density (allowed to be a free function of cosmic time) instead of its equation of state. We should minimize gravitational lensing effect on supernovae by flux-averaging. We need to include complementary data (for example, from the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and large scale structure (LSS)) in a consistent manner to help break the degeneracy between the dark energy density and the matter density fraction. We should push for ambitious future supernova surveys that can observe a large number of supernovae at the highest possible redshifts. I discuss these and other issues that will be important in our quest to unravel the mystery of the nature of dark energy. Current supernova, CMB, and LSS data already rule out dark energy models with dark energy densities that vary greatly with time; with the cosmological constant model providing an excellent fit to the data. A precise measurement of dark energy density as a free function of cosmic time will have a fundamental impact on particle physics and cosmology.

title: Dark Energy Constraints from Baryon Acoustic Oscillations
abstract: Baryon acoustic oscillations (BAOs) in the galaxy power spectrum allow us to extract the scale of the comoving sound horizon at recombination, a cosmological standard ruler accurately determined by the cosmic microwave background anisotropy data. We examine various issues important in the use of BAOs to probe dark energy. We find that if we assume a flat universe and priors on ?m, ?mh2, and ?bh2 as expected from the Planck mission, the constraints on dark energy parameters (w0, w') scale much less steeply with survey area than (area)-1/2 for a given redshift range. The constraints on the dark energy density ?X(z), however, do scale roughly with (area)-1/2 due to the strong correlation between H(z) and ?m (which reduces the effect of priors on ?m). Dark energy constraints from BAOs are very sensitive to the assumed linear scale of matter clustering and the redshift accuracy of the survey. For a BAO survey with 0.5 ? z ? 2, ? (R) = 0.4 [corresponding to kmax (z = 0) = 0.086 h Mpc-1], and ?z/ (1 + z) = 0.001, we find = (0.115,0.183) and (0.069, 0.104) for survey areas of 1000 and 10,000 deg2, respectively. We find that it is critical to minimize the bias in the scale estimates in order to derive reliable dark energy constraints. For a 1000 (10,000) deg2 BAO survey, a 1 ? bias in ln H (z) leads to a 2 ? (3 ?) bias in w'. The bias in w' due to the same scale bias from ln DA (z) is slightly smaller and opposite in sign. The results from this paper will be useful in assessing different proposed BAO surveys and guiding the design of optimal dark energy detection strategies.

title: A robust distance measurement and dark energy constraints from the spherically averaged correlation function of Sloan Digital Sky Survey luminous red Galaxies
abstract: We measure the effective distance to z = 0.26, DV (0.26), and mh 2 from the overall shape of the spherically-averaged two-point correlati on function of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release 7 (DR7) volume-limited luminous red galaxy (LRG) sample, without assuming a dark energy model or a flat Universe. We giv e the mean and covariance matrix of DV (0.26), mh 2 , bh 2 , and ns. We show that these provide an efficient and accurate summary of the volume-limited LRG data. With flat priors on bh 2 and ns (7σWMAP7), we find mh 2 = 0.131 ± 0.020, and rs/DV (0.26) = 0.1466 +0.0068 0.0073 (the ratio of the sound horizon at the drag epoch to the effective distance to z = 0.26). We find that measurements of mh 2 or m are biased low if flux-limited (instead of volume-limited) L RG sample is used. By scaling the spherically-averaged correlation fun ction, we find the Hubble parameter H(0.26) = 79 +12 13 km s 1 Mpc 1 and the angular diameter distance DA(0.26) = 848 +86 88 Mpc. Combining our results with the cosmic microwave background and supernova data, we obtain k = 0.0059 +0.0092 0.0093 andw = 1.023 +0.054 0.053 (assuming a constant dark energy equation of state). We use LasDamas SDSS mock catalogs to compute the covariance matrix of the correlation function, and investigate the use of lognormal catal ogs as an alternative. We find that the input correlation function can be accurately recovered from lognormal catalogs, although they give larger errors on all scales (especially on small sc ales) compared to the mock catalogs derived from cosmological N-body simulations.

title: Constraints on generalized extended inflationary models.
abstract: We study the physical constraints on generalized extended inflationary theories, in which the Brans-Dicke field {Phi} couples to the inflaton sector in the form of two arbitrary power-law functions of {Phi}. We find that the most stringent constraints arise from the need to suppress large bubbles and from considerations of the density perturbations generated during extended inflation. We find that there are sizable portions of the parameter spaces in which all the constraints are satisfied.

title: Wavelets and WMAP non-Gaussianity
abstract: We study the statistical properties of the first-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data on different scales using the spherical Mexican hat wavelet transform. Consistent with the 2004 results of Vielva et al., we find a deviation from Gaussianity in the form of kurtosis of wavelet coefficients on 3-4 scales in the southern Galactic hemisphere. This paper extends the work of Vielva et al. as follows: We find that the non-Gaussian signal shows up more strongly in the form of a larger than expected number of cold pixels and also in the form of scale-scale correlations among wavelet coefficients. We establish the robustness of the non-Gaussian signal under more wide-ranging assumptions regarding the Galactic mask applied to the data and the noise statistics. This signal is unlikely to be due to the usual quadratic term parameterized by the nonlinearity parameter fNL. We use the skewness of the spherical Mexican hat wavelet coefficients to constrain fNL with the first-year WMAP data. Our results constrain fNL to be 50+/-80 at 68% confidence and less than 280 at 99% confidence.

title: Pelegant: A Parallel Accelerator Simulation Code for Electron Generation and Tracking
abstract: elegant is a general‐purpose code for electron accelerator simulation that has a worldwide user base. Recently, many of the time‐intensive elements were parallelized using MPI. Development has used modest Linux clusters and the BlueGene/L supercomputer at Argonne National Laboratory. This has provided very good performance for some practical simulations, such as multiparticle tracking with synchrotron radiation and emittance blow‐up in the vertical rf kick scheme. The effort began with development of a concept that allowed for gradual parallelization of the code, using the existing beamline‐element classification table in elegant. This was crucial as it allowed parallelization without major changes in code structure and without major conflicts with the ongoing evolution of elegant. Because of rounding error and finite machine precision, validating a parallel program against a uniprocessor program with the requirement of bitwise identical results is notoriously difficult. We will report validating simulati...

title: Consistency relations for non-Gaussianity
abstract: We investigate consistency relations for non-Gaussianity. We provide a model-independent dynamical proof for the consistency relation for three-point correlation functions from the Hamiltonian and field redefinition. This relation can be applied to single-field inflation, multi-field inflation and the curvaton scenario. This relation can also be generalized to n-point correlation functions up to arbitrary order in perturbation theory and with arbitrary number of loops.

title: Gravitational lensing effects on parameter estimation in gravitational wave detection with advanced detectors
abstract: The gravitational lensing effect is important to the detection of electromagnetic signals in astrophysics. The gravitational wave lensing effect has also been found significant to gravitational wave detection in the past decade. Recent analysis shows that the lensing events for advanced detectors could be quite plausible. The black holes in our Milky Way Galaxy may play the role of lens objects. These facts motivate us to study the lensing effects on gravitational wave signals for advanced detectors. Taking advanced LIGO and Einstein Telescope for examples, we investigate the lensing effects on the parameter extraction of gravitational wave signals. Using the Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation together with matched filtering methods, we find that the lensing effect for a lens object with small mass is negligible. But when the mass of the lens object increases to larger than 1000M(circle dot) the lensing effect becomes important. Using the template without lensing corrections would result in loss of signal detections. In contrast if we consider templates with lensing effects, the lensed signal may provide much information about the lens black hole. These facts may give us a new way to determine the parameters of the lensing object. For example, this kind of signal may also help us estimate the mass and the distance of the supermassive black hole hosted at the center of our Galaxy.

title: Measurements of the observed cross sections for e+e- ---> exclusive light hadrons containing pi0 pi0 at s**(1/) = 3.773, 3.650 and 3.6648-GeV
abstract: By analyzing the data sets of 17.3, 6.5 and 1.0 pb−1 taken, respectively, at s = 3.773 , 3.650 and 3.6648 GeV with the BES-II detector at the BEPC collider, we measure the observed cross sections for e + e − → π + π − π 0 π 0 , K + K − π 0 π 0 , 2 ( π + π − π 0 ) , K + K − π + π − π 0 π 0 and 3 ( π + π − ) π 0 π 0 at the three energy points. Based on these cross sections we set the upper limits on the observed cross sections and the branching fractions for ψ ( 3770 ) decay into these final states at 90% C.L.

title: SOLAR LIMB PROMINENCE CATCHER AND TRACKER (SLIPCAT): AN AUTOMATED SYSTEM AND ITS PRELIMINARY STATISTICAL RESULTS
abstract: In this paper, we present an automated system, which has the capability to catch and track solar limb prominences based on observations from the extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) 304?? passband. The characteristic parameters and their evolution, including height, position angle, area, length, and brightness, are obtained without manual interventions. By applying the system to the STEREO-B/SECCHI/EUVI 304?? data during 2007 April-2009 October, we obtain a total of 9477 well-tracked prominences and a catalog of these events available online. A detailed analysis of these prominences suggests that the system has a rather good performance. We have obtained several interesting statistical results based on the catalog. Most prominences appear below the latitude of 60? and at the height of about 26 Mm above the solar surface. Most of them are quite stable during the period they are tracked. Nevertheless, some prominences have an upward speed of more than 100 km s?1, and some others show significant downward and/or azimuthal speeds. There are strong correlations among the brightness, area, and height. The expansion of a prominence is probably one major cause of its fading during the rising or erupting process.