Astrophysics > Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics Title: First measurement of the bulk flow of nearby galaxies using the cosmic microwave background (Submitted on 6 Jul 2012) Abstract: Peculiar velocities in the nearby Universe can be measured via the kinetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (kSZ) effect.
Combining galaxy distribution / clustering measurements with weak lensing shear measurements is a hot topic at the moment and this is the latest attempt to use both to reconstruct the COSMOS density field.
This work claims a 4-sigma detection of variation in the fine-structure constant over the sky and, furthermore, if a dipole form is assumed, a preference (also at 4-sigma) for evolution over cosmic time.