Abstract:

I will talk about two ongoing cosmological revolutions fueled by high angular resolution and high sensitivity observations of the cosmic microwave and infrared backgrounds: constraining the properties of the first galaxies in the Universe (the epoch of reionization) via the kinetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect, and constraining astroparticle physics (in particular massive neutrinos) and gravitational physics (dark energy and matter) through gravitational lensing. I will report on the status and prospects of these endeavors, and discuss how they complement studies of the Ly-alpha forest and highly redshifted 21 cm radiation, as well as particle physics experiments.