Observational Probes of Cosmic Acceleration

摘要: The accelerating expansion of the universe is most surprising cosmological discovery in many decades, implying that dominated by some form "dark energy" with exotic physical properties, or Einstein's theory gravity breaks down on scales. profound implications cosmic acceleration have inspired ambitious experimental efforts to measure history and growth structure percent-level precision higher. We review detail four well established methods for making such measurements: Type Ia supernovae, baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO), weak gravitational lensing, galaxy clusters. pay particular attention systematic uncertainties these techniques strategies controlling them at level needed exploit "Stage IV" dark energy facilities as BigBOSS, LSST, Euclid, WFIRST. briefly a number other approaches including redshift-space distortions, Alcock-Paczynski test, direct measurements H_0. present extensive forecasts constraints equation state parameterized deviations from GR, achievable Stage III IV programs incorporate BAO, CMB data. also show required provide competitive those fiducial programs. emphasize value balanced program employs several powerful combination, both cross-check take advantage complementary information. Surveys probe produce data sets broad applications, they continue longstanding astronomical tradition mapping ever greater over larger