= Robert Woodrow Wilson
{c}
{wiki}
= Robert W. Wilson
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{synonym}
= R. W. Wilson
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{synonym}
<Robert Woodrow Wilson> and <Arno Allan Penzias> measured an unexplained microwave signal using a horn-reflector antenna and a receiver compared with a cooled reference. Their 1965 paper reported excess antenna noise that was approximately isotropic, unpolarized and seasonally stable.
They tested contributions from the <atmosphere>, instrumental losses and ground pickup before identifying the residual. Its interpretation as <cosmic microwave background> connected a carefully calibrated radio measurement to the thermal history of the <Universe>. The initial excess antenna <temperature> was not itself a full measurement of the background's <blackbody spectrum>.<A Measurement of Excess Antenna Temperature at 4080 Mc per Second by Arno Allan Penzias and Robert Woodrow Wilson>[pp. 419–421: reference switching, atmospheric and instrumental corrections, and residual characteristics]{ref}
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