Five-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Bayesian Estimation of CMB Polarization Maps

Understand

We describe a sampling method to estimate the polarized CMB signal from observed maps of the sky.

• We use a Metropolis-within-Gibbs algorithm to estimate the polarized CMB map, containing Q and U Stokes parameters at each pixel, and its covariance matrix.
• These can be used as inputs for cosmological analyses.
• The polarized sky signal is parameterized as the sum of three components: CMB, synchrotron emission, and thermal dust emission.