KIPAC Tea Talk: First Maps from the Canadian Galactic Emission Mapper - An 8-10 GHz Northern Sky Polarization Survey / Unveiling Cosmic Messengers: From Plasma Scales to Galactic Observables

González Abstract: Inflation is theorized to be a period in the very early universe in which the universe expanded by a factor of at least e^40. If inflation took place, the gravitational waves produced during this period could have left an imprint in the earliest light we have of the universe: the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). Specifically, in the form of a parity-odd pattern in the polarization field, called a B-mode, uniquely sourced by primordial gravitational waves. Among the several challenges in the search for B-modes, polarized Galactic foregrounds remain one of the most difficult to overcome. The Canadian Galactic Emission Mapper (CGEM) is a 4-metre on-axis radio telescope located at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory in British Columbia, Canada, mapping the Northern sky in polarization at 8–10 GHz, a frequency range where Galactic synchrotron emission is ~10^3 times brighter than near CMB frequencies, enabling high signal-to-noise characterization of this foreground. In this talk, I'll give an overview of CGEM's science goals and I'll describe how we designed this purpose-built instrument to measure the sky with minimal polarization systematics. I will present the first maps from CGEM, discuss early science results and describe the data reduction and mapmaking pipeline developed to produce them.

Orusa Abstract: Over the past decade, space-based experiments such as AMS-02, DAMPE, CALET, and Fermi-LAT, together with ground-based observatories including HAWC, H.E.S.S., and LHAASO, have transformed the study of Galactic cosmic rays and gamma rays into a precision science. This new observational era raises fundamental questions about the plasma processes responsible for particle acceleration, magnetic-field amplification, and cosmic-ray transport in astrophysical environments.In this talk, I will show how kinetic plasma simulations provide a first-principles description of how cosmic rays modify the surrounding plasma near their sources. Focusing on phenomena such as pulsar X-ray filaments, I will discuss how cosmic rays drive plasma instabilities and alter the local magnetic-field structure and particle transport properties. Taken together, these plasma processes establish a direct connection between microscopic kinetic physics and the large-scale cosmic-ray and gamma-ray observables measured across the Galaxy.