David Spergel's Home Page

Over the last decade, the WMAP Satellite has been the main focus of my research. WMAP was successfully launched on June 30, 2001. The results from WMAP are described in a series of papers. The WMAP 2003 paper is currently the 4th most cited paper in the entire SPIRES catalog . Every year from 2003-2006, the First Year WMAP papers were the #1 and #2 most cited papers in the SPIRES data base. In 2007 and 2008, the Three Year Papers were #1 and #3. (WMAP papers were also #5 and #12). In 2009, the Five year WMAP papers are #1, #2 and #3 on the SPIRES list. In 2010, the Seven year WMAP papers are the #1, #2, #7 and #19 on the SPIRES list.

See this interview for a brief description of the WMAP results and see Mike Lemonick's book for the story of the WMAP satellite. My next major CMB project is the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) and supporting observations through the Southern Cosmology Surveys, an international collaboration.

I am part of a group of scientists and engineers at Princeton University who are developing new technologies that should hopefully enable the direct imaging of earth-like planets. I recently led a study of an 4-meter class telescope/occulter system that we called THEIA.

I am part of the new Princeton Center for Theoretical Science. I am also part of the new Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (IPMU)

Here are links to a list of my recent and most-cited papers.

Contact Information

• Room 113, Peyton Hall, Princeton, NJ, 08544
• Phone: (609) 258 3589
• Fax: (609) 258 8226
• email: dns at astro DOT princeton DOT edu

Teaching

• FRS 120 Imagining Other Planets (FRS 120) (Spring 2012)
• AST 303 Astronomical Methods (Spring 2011, 2013) .
• AST 524/PHY 564 Cosmology (AST 524/PHY 564) (Spring 2011, 2013)

Administration

I am serving as Chair of the Department and am the Charles A. Young Professor of Astronomy on the Class of 1897 Foundation. I am an Associate Faculty Member in the Physics Department and in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department. My CV and recent publications.

Talks

Astrophysics Links

National Academy of Sciences

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