Polarized emission from aligned interstellar dust is both a crucial tool for studies of magnetism in the interstellar medium (ISM) and a troublesome contaminant in studies of the polarized cosmic microwave background. In each case, an understanding of the significance of the dust polarization signal requires well-calibrated models that accurately describe dust grains’ physical properties and interactions with their environment. Despite decades of progress in both theory and observation, polarized dust emission models remain largely underconstrained. Using data from the 2012 flight the BLASTPol experiment (the Balloon-borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope for Polarimetry) we have measured the submillimeter polarization spectrum in a translucent molecular cloud for the first time. This measurement shows significant disagreement with the predictions based on some leading dust models. Furthermore, we are currently building BLASTPol's successor instrument, BLAST-TNG (The Next Generation BLAST Experiment). BLAST-TNG will fly aboard a stratospheric balloon from McMurdo Station, Antarctica in December 2017. Here we describe the design of the cryogenic rotation mechanism for the BLAST-TNG achromatic half wave plate. Additionally we discuss the prospects for dust science in the diffuse ISM with BLAST-TNG

Last modified

• 10/21/2018

Creator

• Peter Campbell Ashton

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/N2QB27

Subject

• Physics and Astronomy

Keyword

• instrumentation
• ballooning
• dust
• submillimeter
• polarimetry

Date created

• 2017-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright