LiteBIRD: Mission Overview and Focal Plane Layout

• DOI: 10.1007/s10909-016-1542-8
• Publication Date: 2016-04-06T18:21:36Z
• Authors: T. Matsumura; Y. Akiba; K. Arnold; J. Borrill; R. Chendra; Y. Chinone; A. Cukierman; T. de Haan; M. Dobbs; A. Dominjon; T. Elleflot; J. Errard; T. Fujino; H. Fuke; N. Goeckner-wald; N. Halverson; P. Harvey; M. Hasegawa; K. Hattori; M. Hattori; M. Hazumi; C. Hill; G. Hilton; W. Holzapfel; Y. Hori; J. Hubmayr; K. Ichiki; J. Inatani; M. Inoue; Y. Inoue; F. Irie; K. Irwin; H. Ishino; H. Ishitsuka; O. Jeong; K. Karatsu; S. Kashima; N. Katayama; I. Kawano; B. Keating; A. Kibayashi; Y. Kibe; Y. Kida; K. Kimura; N. Kimura; K. Kohri; E. Komatsu; C. L. Kuo; S. Kuromiya; A. Kusaka; A. Lee; E. Linder; H. Matsuhara; S. Matsuoka; S. Matsuura; S. Mima; K. Mitsuda; K. Mizukami; H. Morii; T. Morishima; M. Nagai; T. Nagasaki; R. Nagata; M. Nakajima; S. Nakamura; T. Namikawa; M. Naruse; K. Natsume; T. Nishibori; K. Nishijo; H. Nishino; T. Nitta; A. Noda; T. Noguchi; H. Ogawa; S. Oguri; I. S. Ohta; C. Otani; N. Okada; A. Okamoto; A. Okamoto; T. Okamura; G. Rebeiz; P. Richards; S. Sakai; N. Sato; Y. Sato; Y. Segawa; S. Sekiguchi; Y. Sekimoto; M. Sekine; U. Seljak; B. Sherwin; K. Shinozaki; S. Shu; R. Stompor; H. Sugai; H. Sugita; T. Suzuki; A. Suzuki; O. Tajima; S. Takada; S. Takakura; K. Takano; Y. Takei; T. Tomaru; N. Tomita; P. Turin; S. Utsunomiya; Y. Uzawa; T. Wada; H. Watanabe; B. Westbrook; N. Whitehorn; Y. Yamada; N. Yamasaki; T. Yamashita; M. Yoshida; T. Yoshida; Y. Yotsumoto
• Keywords: Transition edge sensor

LiteBIRD is a proposed CMB polarization satellite project to probe the inflationary B-mode signal. The satellite is designed to measure the tensor-to-scalar ratio with a 68 % confidence level uncertainty of $$\sigma _\mathrm{r}<10^{-3}$$ , including statistical, instrumental systematic, and foreground uncertainties. LiteBIRD will observe the full sky from the second Lagrange point for 3 years. We have a focal plane layout for observing frequency coverage that spans 40–402 GHz to characterize the galactic foregrounds. We have two detector candidates, transition-edge sensor bolometers and microwave kinetic inductance detectors. In both cases, a telecentric focal plane consists of approximately $$2\times 10^3$$ superconducting detectors. We will present the mission overview of LiteBIRD, the project status, and the TES focal plane layout.