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1. DESI 2024 VI: cosmological constraints from the measurements of baryon acoustic oscillations

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2025/02/021  

   Adame, AG; Aguilar, J; Ahlen, S; Alam, S; Alexander, DM; Alvarez, M; Alves, O; Anand, A; Andrade, U; Armengaud, E; et al (February 2025, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics)

   Abstract We present cosmological results from the measurement of baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) in galaxy, quasar and Lyman-αforest tracers from the first year of observations from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI), to be released in the DESI Data Release 1. DESI BAO provide robust measurements of the transverse comoving distance and Hubble rate, or their combination, relative to the sound horizon, in seven redshift bins from over 6 million extragalactic objects in the redshift range 0.1 <z< 4.2. To mitigate confirmation bias, a blind analysis was implemented to measure the BAO scales. DESI BAO data alone are consistent with the standard flat ΛCDM cosmological model with a matter density Ω_m=0.295±0.015. Paired with a baryon density prior from Big Bang Nucleosynthesis and the robustly measured acoustic angular scale from the cosmic microwave background (CMB), DESI requiresH₀=(68.52±0.62) km s^-1Mpc^-1. In conjunction with CMB anisotropies fromPlanckand CMB lensing data fromPlanckand ACT, we find Ω_m=0.307± 0.005 andH₀=(67.97±0.38) km s^-1Mpc^-1. Extending the baseline model with a constant dark energy equation of state parameterw, DESI BAO alone requirew=-0.99^+0.15_-0.13. In models with a time-varying dark energy equation of state parametrised byw₀andw_a, combinations of DESI with CMB or with type Ia supernovae (SN Ia) individually preferw₀> -1 andw_a< 0. This preference is 2.6σfor the DESI+CMB combination, and persists or grows when SN Ia are added in, giving results discrepant with the ΛCDM model at the 2.5σ, 3.5σor 3.9σlevels for the addition of the Pantheon+, Union3, or DES-SN5YR supernova datasets respectively. For the flat ΛCDM model with the sum of neutrino mass ∑m_νfree, combining the DESI and CMB data yields an upper limit ∑m_ν< 0.072 (0.113) eV at 95% confidence for a ∑m_ν> 0 (∑m_ν> 0.059) eV prior. These neutrino-mass constraints are substantially relaxed if the background dynamics are allowed to deviate from flat ΛCDM. 

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2. Cosmological constraints from the cross-correlation of DESI Luminous Red Galaxies with CMB lensing from Planck PR4 and ACT DR6

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2025/06/008  

   Sailer, Noah; Kim, Joshua; Ferraro, Simone; Madhavacheril, Mathew S; White, Martin; Abril-Cabezas, Irene; Aguilar, Jessica Nicole; Ahlen, Steven; Richard_Bond, J; Brooks, David; et al (June 2025, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics)

   Abstract We infer the growth of large scale structure over the redshift range 0.4 ≲z≲ 1 from the cross-correlation of spectroscopically calibrated Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) selected from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) legacy imaging survey with CMB lensing maps reconstructed from the latestPlanckand ACT data.We adopt a hybrid effective field theory (HEFT) model that robustly regulates the cosmological information obtainable from smaller scales, such that our cosmological constraints are reliably derived from the (predominantly) linear regime.We perform an extensive set of bandpower- and parameter-level systematics checks to ensure the robustness of our results and to characterize the uniformity of the LRG sample.We demonstrate that our results are stable to a wide range of modeling assumptions, finding excellent agreement with a linear theory analysis performed on a restricted range of scales.From a tomographic analysis of the four LRG photometric redshift bins we find that the rate of structure growth is consistent with ΛCDM with an overall amplitude that is ≃ 5-7% lower than predicted by primary CMB measurements with modest (∼ 2σ) statistical significance.From the combined analysis of all four bins and their cross-correlations withPlanckwe obtainS₈= 0.765 ± 0.023, which is less discrepant with primary CMB measurements than previous DESI LRG crossPlanckCMB lensing results.From the cross-correlation with ACT we obtainS₈= 0.790^+0.024_-0.027, while when jointly analyzingPlanckand ACT we findS₈= 0.775^+0.019_-0.022from our data alone andσ₈= 0.772^+0.020_-0.023with the addition of BAO data.These constraints are consistent with the latestPlanckprimary CMB analyses at the ≃ 1.6-2.2σlevel, and are in excellent agreement with galaxy lensing surveys. 

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3. The Atacama Cosmology Telescope: DR6 power spectra, likelihoods and ΛCDM parameters

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2025/11/062  

   Louis, Thibaut; La_Posta, Adrien; Atkins, Zachary; Jense, Hidde T; Abril-Cabezas, Irene; Addison, Graeme E; Ade, Peter AR; Aiola, Simone; Alford, Tommy; Alonso, David; et al (November 2025, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics)

   Abstract We present power spectra of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy in temperature and polarization, measured from the Data Release 6 maps made from Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) data. These cover 19,000 deg²of sky in bands centered at 98, 150 and 220 GHz, with white noise levels three times lower thanPlanckin polarization. We find that the ACT angular power spectra estimated over 10,000 deg², and measured to arcminute scales in TT, TE and EE, are well fit by the sum of CMB and foregrounds, where the CMB spectra are described by the ΛCDM model. Combining ACT with larger-scalePlanckdata, the joint P-ACT dataset provides tight limits on the ingredients, expansion rate, and initial conditions of the universe. We find similar constraining power, and consistent results, from either thePlanckpower spectra or from ACT combined withWMAPdata, as well as from either temperature or polarization in the joint P-ACT dataset. When combined with CMB lensing from ACT andPlanck, and baryon acoustic oscillation data from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI DR1), we measure a baryon density of Ω_bh²= 0.0226 ± 0.0001, a cold dark matter density of Ω_ch²= 0.118 ± 0.001, a Hubble constant ofH₀= 68.22 ± 0.36 km/s/Mpc, a spectral index ofn_s= 0.974 ± 0.003, and an amplitude of density fluctuations ofσ₈= 0.813 ± 0.005. Including the DESI DR2 data tightens the Hubble constant toH₀= 68.43 ± 0.27 km/s/Mpc; ΛCDM parameters agree between the P-ACT and DESI DR2 data at the 1.6σlevel. We find no evidence for excess lensing in the power spectrum, and no departure from spatial flatness. The contribution from Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) anisotropy is detected at high significance; we find evidence for a tilt with suppressed small-scale power compared to our baseline SZ template spectrum, consistent with hydrodynamical simulations with feedback. 

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4. Probing Physics beyond the Standard Model through Combined Analyses of Next-generation Type Ia Supernova, Cosmic Microwave Background, and Baryon Acoustic Oscillation Surveys

   https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae64f1  

   Raghunathan, Srinivasan; Mitra, Ayan; Šarčević, Nikolina; Ge, Fei; Ravoux, Corentin; Georgiou, Christos; Hložek, Renée; Kessler, Richard; Narayan, Gautham; Rogozenski, Paul; et al (May 2026, The Astrophysical Journal)

   Abstract Observations of Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia), which probe the late Universe, together with baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) and the cosmic microwave background (CMB), which probe the intermediate and early epochs, provide complementary constraints on the expansion history of the Universe. In this work, we forecast constraints on dark energy and other extensions to the standard cosmological model by combining the SN Ia sample expected from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), data from current and forthcoming CMB surveys, and BAO measurements from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI). For the CMB, we use temperature, polarization, and lensing power spectra (TT/EE/TE/ϕϕ) from the South Pole Telescope, the planned Advanced Simons Observatory, and a CMB-S4–like experiment. We derive constraints on ΛCDM and its extensions involving the dark energy equation-of-state parameters (w₀, w_a) and the sum of neutrino masses ∑m_νusing a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling framework. We find that the LSST Year 3 SN Ia sample can improve upon the DES Year 5 dark energy constraints by a factor of 2−2.5×, with the gains driven primarily by the significantly higher SN Ia density in the LSST sample. Similarly, DESI-DR3 shows up to a 1.8× improvement on dark energy parameters over DR2, driven largely by the substantial increase in the low-redshift sample. Combining CMB with LSST-Y3-SN Ia and DESI-DR3-BAO yieldsσ(w₀) = 0.028 andσ(w_a) = 0.11 forw₀w_aCDM cosmology with the results being largely independent of the CMB dataset. The constraints weaken by 10%–30% when freeing ∑m_νand spatial curvature. Moreover, the joint analysis of the three datasets can enable a 2σ–3σdetection of ∑m_ν. 

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5. The Atacama Cosmology Telescope: DR6 constraints on extended cosmological models

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2025/11/063  

   Calabrese, Erminia; Hill, J Colin; Jense, Hidde T; La_Posta, Adrien; Abril-Cabezas, Irene; Addison, Graeme E; Ade, Peter AR; Aiola, Simone; Alford, Tommy; Alonso, David; et al (November 2025, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics)

   Abstract We use new cosmic microwave background (CMB) primary temperature and polarization anisotropy measurements from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) Data Release 6 (DR6) to test foundational assumptions of the standard cosmological model, ΛCDM, and set constraints on extensions to it. We derive constraints from the ACT DR6 power spectra alone, as well as in combination with legacy data from thePlanckmission. To break geometric degeneracies, we include ACT andPlanckCMB lensing data and baryon acoustic oscillation data from DESI Year-1. To test the dependence of our results on non-ACT data, we also explore combinations replacingPlanckwithWMAPand DESI with BOSS, and further add supernovae measurements from Pantheon+ for models that affect the late-time expansion history. We verify the near-scale-invariance (running of the spectral indexdn_s/dlnk= 0.0062 ± 0.0052) and adiabaticity of the primordial perturbations. Neutrino properties are consistent with Standard Model predictions: we find no evidence for new light, relativistic species that are free-streaming (N_eff= 2.86 ± 0.13, which combined with astrophysical measurements of primordial helium and deuterium abundances becomesN_eff= 2.89 ± 0.11), for non-zero neutrino masses (∑m_ν< 0.089 eV at 95% CL), or for neutrino self-interactions. We also find no evidence for self-interacting dark radiation (N_idr< 0.134), or for early-universe variation of fundamental constants, including the fine-structure constant (α_EM/α_EM,0= 1.0043 ± 0.0017) and the electron mass (m_e/m_e,0= 1.0063 ± 0.0056). Our data are consistent with standard big bang nucleosynthesis (we findY_p= 0.2312 ± 0.0092), theCOBE/FIRAS-inferred CMB temperature (we findT_CMB= 2.698 ± 0.016 K), a dark matter component that is collisionless and with only a small fraction allowed as axion-like particles, a cosmological constant (w= -0.986 ± 0.025), and the late-time growth rate predicted by general relativity (γ= 0.663 ± 0.052). We find no statistically significant preference for a departure from the baseline ΛCDM model. In fits to models invoking early dark energy, primordial magnetic fields, or an arbitrary modified recombination history, we findH₀= 69.9^+0.8_-1.5, 69.1 ± 0.5, or 69.6 ± 1.0 km/s/Mpc, respectively; using BOSS instead of DESI BAO data reduces the central values of these constraints by 1–1.5 km/s/Mpc while only slightly increasing the error bars. In general, models introduced to increase the Hubble constant or to decrease the amplitude of density fluctuations inferred from the primary CMB are not favored over ΛCDM by our data. 

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