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Fast Breaking Comments

By Uros Seljak

ESI Special Topics, February 2006
Citing URL - http://www.esi-topics.com/fbp/2006/february06-UrosSeljak.html

Uros Seljak answers a few questions about this month's fast breaking paper in the field of Physics.

From •>>February 2006

Field: Physics
 Article Title: Cosmological parameter analysis including SDSS Ly alpha forest and galaxy bias: Constraints on the primordial spectrum of fluctuations, neutrino mass, and dark energy
Authors: Seljak, U;Makarov, A;McDonald, P;Anderson, SF;Bahcall, NA [see also];Brinkmann, J;Burles, S;Cen, R;Doi, M;Gunn, JE;Ivezic, Z;Kent, S;Loveday, J;Lupton, RH;Munn, JA;Nichol, RC;Ostriker, JP;Schlegel, DJ;Schneider, DP;Tegmark, M;Berk, DEV;Weinberg, DH;York, DG
Journal: PHYS REV D
Volume: 71
Issue: 10
Page: art. no.-103515
Year: MAY 2005
* Princeton Univ, Dept Phys, Princeton, NJ 08544 USA.
* Princeton Univ, Dept Phys, Princeton, NJ 08544 USA.
* Int Ctr Theoret Phys, Trieste, Italy.
* Univ Washington, Dept Anat, Seattle, WA 98195 USA.
* Princeton Univ Observ, Princeton, NJ 08544 USA.
* Apache Point Observ, Sunspot, NM 88349 USA.
* MIT, Dept Phys, Cambridge, MA 02139 USA.
* Univ Tokyo, Astron Inst, Sch Sci, Tokyo, Japan.
* USN Observ, Flagstaff Stn, Flagstaff, AZ 86002 USA.
* Univ Portsmouth, Inst Cosmol & Gravitat, Portsmouth, Hants, England.
* Univ Cambridge, Astron Inst, Cambridge, England.
* Penn State Univ, Dept Astron & Astrophys, University Pk, PA 16802 USA.
* Univ Penn, Dept Phys, Philadelphia, PA 19104 USA.
* Ohio State Univ, Dept Astron, Columbus, OH 43210 USA.
* Univ Chicago, Dept Astron & Astrophys, Chicago, IL 60637 USA.

ST:  Why do you think your paper is highly cited?


“This work was many years in the making...”

It is an analysis of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data of quasar absorption lines, which is a data set two orders of magnitude larger than any previous data set. This analysis leads to a significant improvement in our understanding of cosmological parameters.

ST:  Does it describe a new discovery or a new methodology that's useful to others?

It presents both new results and synthesizes them with previous data. The actual methodology is described in companion papers (Patrick McDonald et al.).

ST:  Could you summarize the significance of your paper in layman's terms?

We show that a simple cosmological model with only a handful of parameters can explain the new quasar absorption data, as well as previous data. We obtain new constraints on neutrino mass, the nature of dark energy, and the nature of the generation of initial "lumpiness" in the universe.

ST:  How did you become involved in this research, and were there successes or failures along the way?

I started working on SDSS in 1999 when I joined Princeton University. This work was many years in the making, so it is very satisfying to finally see it in print and getting the attention of others in the field.End

Uros Seljak
Professor
Department of Physics 
Princeton University
Princeton, NJ, USA

ESI Special Topics, February 2006
Citing URL - http://www.esi-topics.com/fbp/2006/february06-UrosSeljak.html

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