Detection of Baryon Acoustic Oscillation Features in the Large-Scale 3-Point Correlation Function of SDSS BOSS DR12 CMASS Galaxies

Understand

We present the large-scale 3-point correlation function (3PCF) of the SDSS DR12 CMASS sample of $777,202$ Luminous Red Galaxies, the largest-ever sample used for a 3PCF or bispectrum measurement.

• We make the first high-significance ($4.5\sigma$) detection of Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) in the 3PCF.
• Using these acoustic features in the 3PCF as a standard ruler, we measure the distance to $z=0.57$ to $1.7\%$ precision (statistical plus systematic).
• We find $D_{\rm V}= 2024\pm29\;{\rm Mpc\;(stat)}\pm20\;{\rm Mpc\;(sys)}$ for our fiducial cosmology (consistent with Planck 2015) and bias model.