Living Rev. Relativity, 18, (2015), 2 ,)6).

' 2% 6)% 73
DOI 10.1007/lrr-2015-2
IN RELATIVITY

The Hubble Constant

Neal Jackson
Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics
School of Physics and Astronomy
University of Manchester
Turing Building
Manchester M13 9PL, U.K.
email: [email protected]
http://www.jodrellbank.manchester.ac.uk/~njj/

Accepted: 14 August 2014

Published: 24 September 2015
(Update of lrr-2007-4)

Abstract
I review the current state of determinations of the Hubble constant, which gives the length
scale of the Universe by relating the expansion velocity of objects to their distance. There are
two broad categories of measurements. The first uses individual astrophysical objects which
have some property that allows their intrinsic luminosity or size to be determined, or allows
the determination of their distance by geometric means. The second category comprises the
use of all-sky cosmic microwave background, or correlations between large samples of galaxies,
to determine information about the geometry of the Universe and hence the Hubble constant,
typically in a combination with other cosmological parameters. Many, but not all, object-
based measurements give H 0 values of around 72 – 74 km s–1 Mpc–1 , with typical errors of
2 – 3 km s–1 Mpc–1 . This is in mild discrepancy with CMB-based measurements, in particular
those from the Planck satellite, which give values of 67 – 68 km s–1 Mpc–1 and typical errors of
1 – 2 km s–1 Mpc–1 . The size of the remaining systematics indicate that accuracy rather than
precision is the remaining problem in a good determination of the Hubble constant. Whether
a discrepancy exists, and whether new physics is needed to resolve it, depends on details
of the systematics of the object-based methods, and also on the assumptions about other
cosmological parameters and which datasets are combined in the case of the all-sky methods.

Keywords: Cosmology, Hubble constant

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Neal Jackson,
“The Hubble Constant”,
Living Rev. Relativity, 18, (2015), 2.
DOI 10.1007/lrr-2015-2.

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 Article Revisions
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24 September 2014: Major revision, updated and expanded. The number of references has
increased from 179 to 242.

ˆ A new section (2.1) on megamaser cosmography was added, as this has developed significantly
since the first edition.
ˆ Section 3 on the classical distance ladder has been extensively re-written. It now focuses much
less on the detailed disagreements based on the metallicity dependence of the P-L relationship
of Cepheids, since these have been superseded to a large extent by better calibration. Instead,
more space is devoted to developments since 2007.
ˆ The gravitational-lensing section (2.2) has been extensively updated and much of the detail
from pre-2007 papers has been removed in favour of discussion of developments since 2007,
particularly the Suyu et al. papers and an update on the discussion of mass degeneracies.
ˆ The section on cosmological measurement (4) has been updated, mainly because of the advent
of Planck since the first edition.
ˆ A new conclusion (5) has been added to try to tie together the results from different obser-
vational programmes.

In addition, the order of the article has been extensively rearranged, following an updated intro-
ductory section. A few sections (mostly where relatively little progress has been made) have been
changed relatively little apart from correction of errors – i.e., the introduction and the sections on
S-Z effect and gravitational waves.

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Contents
1 Introduction 5
1.1 A brief history . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.2 A little cosmology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

2 One-Step Distance Methods 11

2.1 Megamaser cosmology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.2 Gravitational lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2.1 Basics of lensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2.2 Principles of time delays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.2.3 The problem with lens time delays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.2.4 Time delay measurements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.2.5 Derivation of H 0 : Now, and the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.3 The Sunyaev–Zel’dovich effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.4 Gamma-ray propagation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

3 Local Distance Ladder 22

3.1 Preliminary remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.2 Basic principle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.3 Problems and comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.3.1 Distance to the LMC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.3.2 Cepheid systematics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.3.3 SNe Ia systematics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
3.3.4 Other methods of establishing the distance scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

4 The CMB and Cosmological Estimates of the Distance Scale 29

4.1 The physics of the anisotropy spectrum and its implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
4.2 Degeneracies and implications for H 0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
4.2.1 Combined constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

5 Conclusion 34

References 36

List of Tables
1 Time delays, with 1-𝜎 errors, from the literature. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2 Some recent measurements of 𝐻0 using the S-Z effect. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

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The Hubble Constant 5

1 Introduction
1.1 A brief history
The last century saw an expansion in our view of the world from a static, Galaxy-sized Universe,
whose constituents were stars and “nebulae” of unknown but possibly stellar origin, to the view
that the observable Universe is in a state of expansion from an initial singularity over ten billion
years ago, and contains approximately 100 billion galaxies. This paradigm shift was summarised in
a famous debate between Shapley and Curtis in 1920; summaries of the views of each protagonist
can be found in [43] and [195].
The historical background to this change in world view has been extensively discussed and
whole books have been devoted to the subject of distance measurement in astronomy [176]. At
the heart of the change was the conclusive proof that what we now know as external galaxies lay
at huge distances, much greater than those between objects in our own Galaxy. The earliest such
distance determinations included those of the galaxies NGC 6822 [93], M33 [94] and M31 [96], by
Edwin Hubble.
As well as determining distances, Hubble also considered redshifts of spectral lines in galaxy
spectra which had previously been measured by Slipher in a series of papers [197, 198]. If a spectral
line of emitted wavelength 𝜆0 is observed at a wavelength 𝜆, the redshift 𝑧 is defined as

𝑧 = 𝜆/𝜆0 − 1 . (1)

For nearby objects and assuming constant gravitational tidal field, the redshift may be thought
of as corresponding to a recession velocity 𝑣 which for nearby objects behaves in a way predicted
by a simple Doppler formula,1 𝑣 = 𝑐𝑧. Hubble showed that a relation existed between distance
and redshift (see Figure 1); more distant galaxies recede faster, an observation which can naturally
be explained if the Universe as a whole is expanding. The relation between the recession velocity
and distance is linear in nearby objects, as it must be if the same dependence is to be observed
from any other galaxy as it is from our own Galaxy (see Figure 2). The proportionality constant
is the Hubble constant 𝐻0 , where the subscript indicates a value as measured now. Unless the
Universe’s expansion does not accelerate or decelerate, the slope of the velocity–distance relation is
different for observers at different epochs of the Universe. As well as the velocity corresponding to
the universal expansion, a galaxy also has a “peculiar velocity”, typically of a few hundred kms–1 ,
due to groups or clusters of galaxies in its vicinity. Peculiar velocities are a nuisance if determining
the Hubble constant from relatively nearby objects for which they are comparable to the recession
velocity. Once the distance is > 50 Mpc, the recession velocity is large enough for the error in 𝐻0
due to the peculiar velocity to be less than about 10%.
Recession velocities are very easy to measure; all we need is an object with an emission line and
a spectrograph. Distances are very difficult. This is because in order to measure a distance, we
need a standard candle (an object whose luminosity is known) or a standard ruler (an object whose
length is known), and we then use apparent brightness or angular size to work out the distance.
Good standard candles and standard rulers are in short supply because most such objects require
1 See [105] and references therein, e.g., [27], for discussion of the details of the interpretation of redshift in an

expanding Universe. The first level of sophistication involves maintaining the GR principle that space is locally
Minkowskian, so that in a small region of space all effects must reduce to SR (for instance, in Peacock’s [155]
example, the expansion of the Universe does not imply that a long-lived human will grow to four metres tall in
the next 1010 years). Redshift can be thought of as a series of transformations in photon wavelengths between an
infinite succession of closely-separated observers, resulting in an overall wavelength shift between two observers with
a finite separation and therefore an associated “velocity”. The second level of sophistication is to ask what this
velocity actually represents. [105] calculates the ratio of photon wavelength shifts between pairs of fundamental
observers to the shifts in their proper separation in the presence of arbitrary gravitational fields, and shows that
this ratio only corresponds to the purely dynamical result if the gravitational tide is constant.

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6 Neal Jackson

Figure 1: Hubble’s original diagram of distance to nearby galaxies, derived from measurements using
Cepheid variables, against velocity, derived from redshift. The Hubble constant is the slope of this relation,
and in this diagram is a factor of nearly 10 steeper than currently accepted values. Image reproduced
from [95].

Figure 2: Illustration of the Hubble law. Galaxies at all points of the square grid are receding from the
black galaxy at the centre, with velocities proportional to their distance away from it. From the point of
view of the second, green, galaxy two grid points to the left, all velocities are modified by vector addition
of its velocity relative to the black galaxy (red arrows). When this is done, velocities of galaxies as seen
by the second galaxy are indicated by green arrows; they all appear to recede from this galaxy, again with
a Hubble-law linear dependence of velocity on distance.

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The Hubble Constant 7

that we understand their astrophysics well enough to work out what their luminosity or size actually
is. Neither stars nor galaxies by themselves remotely approach the uniformity needed; even when
selected by other, easily measurable properties such as colour, they range over orders of magnitude
in luminosity and size for reasons that are astrophysically interesting but frustrating for distance
measurement. The ideal 𝐻0 object, in fact, is one which involves as little astrophysics as possible.
Hubble originally used a class of stars known as Cepheid variables for his distance determina-
tions. These are giant blue stars, the best known of which is 𝛼UMa, or Polaris. In most normal
stars, a self-regulating mechanism exists in which any tendency for the star to expand or contract
is quickly damped out. In a small range of temperature on the Hertzsprung–Russell (H-R) dia-
gram, around 7000 – 8000 K, particularly at high luminosity,2 this does not happen and pulsations
occur. These pulsations, the defining property of Cepheids, have a characteristic form, a steep rise
followed by a gradual fall. They also have a period which is directly proportional to luminosity,
because brighter stars are larger, and therefore take longer to pulsate. The period-luminosity re-
lationship was discovered by Leavitt [123] by studying a sample of Cepheid variables in the Large
Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Because these stars were known to be all at the same distance, their
correlation of apparent magnitude with period therefore implied the P-L relationship.
The Hubble constant was originally measured as 500 km s−1 Mpc−1 [95] and its subsequent
history was a more-or-less uniform revision downwards. In the early days this was caused by
bias3 in the original samples [12], confusion between bright stars and H ii regions in the original
samples [97, 185] and differences between type I and II Cepheids4 [7]. In the second half of the
last century, the subject was dominated by a lengthy dispute between investigators favouring
values around 50 km s−1 Mpc−1 and those preferring higher values of 100 km s−1 Mpc−1 . Most
astronomers would now bet large amounts of money on the true value lying between these extremes,
and this review is an attempt to explain why and also to try and evaluate the evidence for the
best-guess current value. It is not an attempt to review the global history of 𝐻0 determinations, as
this has been done many times, often by the original protagonists or their close collaborators. For
an overall review of this process see, for example, [223] and [210]. Compilations of data and analysis
of them are given by Huchra (http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~huchra/hubble), and Gott ([77],
updated by [35]).5 Further reviews of the subject, with various different emphases and approaches,
are given by [212, 68].
In summary, the ideal object for measuring the Hubble constant:
2 This is known in the literature as the “instability strip” and is almost, but not quite, parallel to the luminosity

axis on the H-R diagram. In normal stars, any compression of the star, and the associated rise in temperature,
results in a decrease in opacity; the resulting escape of photons produces expansion and cooling. For stars in the
instability strip, a layer of partially ionized He close to the surface causes opacity to rise instead of falling with an
increase in temperature, producing a degree of positive feedback and consequently oscillations. The instability strip
has a finite width, which causes a small degree of dispersion in period–luminosity correlations among Cepheids.
3 There are numerous subtle and less-subtle biases in distance measurement; see [213] for a blow-by-blow account.

The simplest bias, the “classical” Malmquist bias, arises because, in any population of objects with a distribution
in intrinsic luminosity, only the brighter members of the population will be seen at large distances. The result is
that the inferred average luminosity is greater than the true luminosity, biasing distance measurements towards the
systematically short. The Behr bias [12] from 1951 is a distance-dependent version of the Malmquist bias, namely
that at higher distances, increasingly bright galaxies will be missing from samples. This leads to an overestimate of
the average brightness of the standard candle which becomes worse at higher distance.
4 Cepheids come in two flavours: type I and type II, corresponding to population I and II stars. Population II stars

are an earlier metal-poor generation of stars, which formed after the hypothetical, truly primordial Population III
stars, but before later-generation Population I stars like the Sun which contain significant extra amounts of elements
other than hydrogen and helium due to enrichment of the ISM by supernovae in the meantime. The name “Cepheid”
derives from the fact that the star 𝛿 Cephei was the first to be identified (by Goodricke in 1784). Population II
Cepheids are sometimes known as W Virginis stars, after their prototype, W Vir, and a W Vir star is typically a
factor of 3 fainter than a classical Cepheid of the same period.
5 The conclusion of the latter, that based on median statistics of the Huchra compilation, 𝐻
0 = 67 ±
2 km s−1 Mpc−1 , is slightly scary in retrospect given the Planck value of 67.2 ± 1.3 km s−1 Mpc−1 for a flat
Universe [2].

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8 Neal Jackson

ˆ Has a property which allows it to be treated as either as a standard candle or as a standard

ruler
ˆ Can be used independently of other calibrations (i.e., in a one-step process)
ˆ Lies at a large enough distance (a few tens of Mpc or greater) that peculiar velocities are
small compared to the recession velocity at that distance
ˆ Involves as little astrophysics as possible, so that the distance determination does not depend
on internal properties of the object
ˆ Provides the Hubble constant independently of other cosmological parameters.

Many different methods are discussed in this review. We begin with one-step methods, and
in particular with the use of megamasers in external galaxies – arguably the only method which
satisfies all the above criteria. Two other one-step methods, gravitational lensing and Sunyaev–
Zel’dovich measurements, which have significant contaminating astrophysical effects are also dis-
cussed. The review then discusses two other programmes: first, the Cepheid-based distance lad-
ders, where the astrophysics is probably now well understood after decades of effort, but which
are not one-step processes; and second, information from the CMB, an era where astrophysics is
in the linear regime and therefore simpler, but where 𝐻0 is not determined independently of other
cosmological parameters in a single experiment, without further assumptions.

1.2 A little cosmology

The expanding Universe is a consequence, although not the only possible consequence, of general
relativity coupled with the assumption that space is homogeneous (that is, it has the same average
density of matter at all points at a given time) and isotropic (the same in all directions). In
1922, Friedman [72] showed that given that assumption, we can use the Einstein field equations of
general relativity to write down the dynamics of the Universe using the following two equations,
now known as the Friedman equations:
1
𝑎˙ 2 − (8𝜋𝐺𝜌 + Λ)𝑎2 = −𝑘𝑐2 , (2)
3
𝑎
¨ 4 1
= − 𝜋𝐺(𝜌 + 3𝑝/𝑐2 ) + Λ . (3)
𝑎 3 3
Here 𝑎 = 𝑎(𝑡) is the scale factor of the Universe. It is fundamentally related to redshift, because
the quantity (1 + 𝑧) is the ratio of the scale of the Universe now to the scale of the Universe at
the time of emission of the light (𝑎0 /𝑎). Λ is the cosmological constant, which appears in the field
equation of general relativity as an extra term. It corresponds to a universal repulsion and was
originally introduced by Einstein to coerce the Universe into being static. On Hubble’s discovery
of the expansion of the Universe, he removed it, only for it to reappear seventy years later as a
result of new data [157, 169] (see also [34, 235] for a review). 𝑘 is a curvature term, and is −1,
0, or +1, according to whether the global geometry of the Universe is negatively curved, spatially
flat, or positively curved. 𝜌 is the density of the contents of the Universe, 𝑝 is the pressure and
dots represent time derivatives. For any particular component of the Universe, we need to specify
an equation for the relation of pressure to density to solve these equations; for most components
of interest such an equation is of the form 𝑝 = 𝑤𝜌. Component densities vary with scale factor 𝑎
as the Universe expands, and hence vary with time.
At any given time, we can define a Hubble parameter

𝐻(𝑡) = 𝑎/𝑎
˙ , (4)

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The Hubble Constant 9

which is obviously related to the Hubble constant, because it is the ratio of an increase in scale
factor to the scale factor itself. In fact, the Hubble constant 𝐻0 is just the value of 𝐻 at the current
time.6
If Λ = 0, we can derive the kinematics of the Universe quite simply from the first Friedman
equation. For a spatially flat Universe 𝑘 = 0, and we therefore have
3𝐻 2
𝜌 = 𝜌c ≡ , (5)
8𝜋𝐺
where 𝜌c is known as the critical density. For Universes whose densities are less than this critical
density, 𝑘 < 0 and space is negatively curved. For such Universes it is easy to see from the first
Friedman equation that we require 𝑎˙ > 0, and therefore the Universe must carry on expanding
for ever. For positively curved Universes (𝑘 > 0), the right hand side is negative, and we reach a
point at which 𝑎˙ = 0. At this point the expansion will stop and thereafter go into reverse, leading
eventually to a Big Crunch as 𝑎˙ becomes larger and more negative.
For the global history of the Universe in models with a cosmological constant, however, we
need to consider the Λ term as providing an effective acceleration. If the cosmological constant is
positive, the Universe is almost bound to expand forever, unless the matter density is very much
greater than the energy density in cosmological constant and can collapse the Universe before the
acceleration takes over. (A negative cosmological constant will always cause recollapse, but is not
part of any currently likely world model). Carroll [34] provides further discussion of this point.
We can also introduce some dimensionless symbols for energy densities in the cosmological
constant at the current time, ΩΛ ≡ Λ/(3𝐻02 ), and in “curvature energy”, Ω𝑘 ≡ −𝑘𝑐2 /𝐻02 . By
rearranging the first Friedman equation we obtain
𝐻2 𝜌
= − Ω𝑘 𝑎−2 + ΩΛ . (6)
𝐻02 𝜌c
The density in a particular component of the Universe 𝑋, as a fraction of critical density, can
be written as
𝜌𝑋 /𝜌c = Ω𝑋 𝑎𝛼 , (7)
where the exponent 𝛼 represents the dilution of the component as the Universe expands. It is
related to the 𝑤 parameter defined earlier by the equation 𝛼 = −3(1 + 𝑤). For ordinary matter
𝛼 = −3, and for radiation 𝛼 = −4, because in addition to geometrical dilution as the universe
expands, the energy of radiation decreases as the wavelength increases. The cosmological constant
energy density remains the same no matter how the size of the Universe increases, hence for a
cosmological constant we have 𝛼 = 0 and 𝑤 = −1. 𝑤 = −1 is not the only possibility for
producing acceleration, however. Any general class of “quintessence” models for which 𝑤 < − 31
will do; the case 𝑤 < −1 is probably the most extreme and eventually results in the accelerating
expansion becoming so dominant that all gravitational interactions become impossible due to the
shrinking boundary of the observable Universe, finally resulting in all matter being torn apart in
a “Big Rip” [32]. In current models Λ will become increasingly dominant in the dynamics of the
Universe as it expands. Note that
∑︁
Ω𝑋 + Ω Λ + Ω 𝑘 = 1 (8)
𝑋

by definition, because Ω𝑘 = 0 implies a flat Universe in which the total energy density in matter
together with the cosmological constant is equal to the critical density. Universes for which Ω𝑘 is
6 Historically, the Hubble constant has often been quoted as 𝐻 = 100ℎ km s−1 Mpc−1 , as a way of maintaining
0
agnosticism in an era where observations allowed a wide range in ℎ. This is largely disappearing, but papers using
ℎ can be hard to interpret [42]

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10 Neal Jackson

almost zero tend to evolve away from this point, so the observed near-flatness is a puzzle known
as the “flatness problem”; the hypothesis of a period of rapid expansion known as inflation in the
early history of the Universe predicts this near-flatness naturally. As well as a solution to the
flatness problem, inflation is an attractive idea because it provides a natural explanation for the
large-scale uniformity of the Universe in regions which would otherwise not be in causal contact
with each other.
We finally obtain an equation for the variation of the Hubble parameter with time in terms of
the Hubble constant (see, e.g., [155]),

𝐻 2 = 𝐻02 (ΩΛ + Ωm 𝑎−3 + Ωr 𝑎−4 + Ω𝑘 𝑎−2 ) , (9)

where Ωr represents the energy density in radiation and Ωm the energy density in matter.
To obtain cosmological distances, we need to perform integrals of the form
∫︁
d𝑧
𝐷𝐶 = 𝑐 , (10)
𝐻(𝑧)

where the right-hand side can be expressed as a “Hubble distance” 𝐷𝐻 ≡ 𝑐/𝐻0 , multiplied by an
integral over dimensionless quantities such as the Ω terms. We can define a number of distances in
cosmology, including the “comoving” distance 𝐷𝐶 defined above. The most important for present
purposes are the angular diameter distance 𝐷A = 𝐷C /(1 + 𝑧), which relates the apparent angular
size of an object to its proper size, and the luminosity distance 𝐷L = (1 + 𝑧)2 𝐷A , which relates the
observed flux of an object to its intrinsic luminosity. For currently popular models, the angular
diameter distance increases to a maximum as 𝑧 increases to a value of order 1, and decreases
thereafter. Formulae for, and fuller explanations of, both distances are given by [87].

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The Hubble Constant 11

2 One-Step Distance Methods

In this section, we examine the main methods for one-step Hubble constant determination using
astrophysical objects, together with their associated problems and assess the observational situation
with respect to each. Other methods have been proposed7 but do not yet have the observations
needed to apply them.

2.1 Megamaser cosmology

To determine the Hubble constant, measurements of distance are needed. In the nearby universe,
the ideal object is one which is distant enough for peculiar velocities to be small – in practice
around 50 Mpc – but for which a distance can be measured in one step and without a ladder of
calibration involving other measurements in more nearby systems. Megamaser systems in external
galaxies offer an opportunity to do this.
A megamaser system in a galaxy involves clumps of gas which are typically located ∼ 0.1 pc
from the centre of the galaxy, close to the central supermassive black hole which is thought to lie
at the centre of most if not all galaxies. These clumps radiate coherently in the water line at a
frequency of approximately 22 GHz. This can be observed at the required milliarcsecond resolution
scale using Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) techniques. With VLBI spectroscopy, the
velocity of each individual clump can be measured accurately, and by repeated observations the
movements of each clump can be followed and the acceleration determined. Assuming that the
clumps are in Keplerian rotation, the radius of each clump from the central black hole can therefore
be calculated, and the distance to the galaxy follows from knowledge of this radius together with
the angular separation of the clump from the galaxy centre. The black-hole mass is also obtained as
a by-product of the analysis. The analysis is not completely straightforward, as the disk is warped
and viscous, with four parameters (eccentricity, position angle, periapsis angle and inclination)
describing the global properties of the disk and four further parameters describing the properties of
the warping [100]. In principle it is vulnerable to systematics involving the modelling parameters
not adequately describing the disk, but such systematics can be simulated for plausible extra
dynamical components [100] and are likely to be small.
The first maser system to be discovered in an external galaxy was that in the object NGC 4258.
This galaxy has a shell of masers which are oriented almost edge-on [136, 79] and apparently
in Keplerian rotation. Measurements of the distance to this galaxy have become steadily more
accurate since the original work [84, 98, 100], although the distance of ∼ 7 Mpc to this object is
not sufficient to avoid large (tens of percent) systematics due to peculiar velocities in any attempt
to determine 𝐻0 .
More recently, a systematic programme has been carried out to determine maser distances
to other, more distant galaxies; the Megamaser Cosmology Project [167]. The first fruits of this
programme include the measurement of the dynamics of the maser system in the galaxy UGC 3789,
7 For example, one topic that may merit more than a footnote in the future is the study of cosmology using

gravitational waves. In particular, a coalescing binary system consisting of two neutron stars produces gravitational
waves, and under those circumstances the measurement of the amplitude and frequency of the waves determines
the distance to the object independently of the stellar masses [193]. This was studied in more detail by [36] and
extended to more massive black-hole systems [90, 45]. More massive coalescing signals produce lower-frequency
gravitational-wave signals, which can be detected with the proposed LISA space-based interferometer (http://
lisa.nasa.gov/documentation.html). The major difficulty is obtaining the redshift measurement to go with the
distance estimate, since the galaxy in which the coalescence event has taken place must be identified. Given this,
however, the precision of the 𝐻0 measurement is limited only by weak gravitational lensing along the line of sight,
and even this is reducible by observations of multiple systems or detailed investigations of matter along the line of
sight. 𝐻0 determinations to ∼ 2% should be possible, but depend on the launch of LISA or a similar mission. This
is an event that is probably decades away, although a pathfinder mission to test some of the technology is due for
launch in 2015.

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12 Neal Jackson

which have become steadily more accurate as the campaign has progressed [167, 25, 168]. A distance
of 49.6±5.1 Mpc is determined, corresponding to 𝐻0 = 68.9±7.1 km s−1 Mpc−1 [168]; the error is
dominated by the uncertainty in the likely peculiar velocity, which itself is derived from studies of
the Tully–Fisher relation in nearby clusters [132]. Efforts are under way to find more megamasers
to include in the sample, with success to date in the cases of NGC 6264 and Mrk 1419. Braatz
et al. [24] and Kuo et al. [122] report preliminary results in the cases of the latter two objects,
resulting in an overall determination of 𝐻0 = 68.0 ± 4.8 km s−1 Mpc−1 (68 ± 9 km s−1 Mpc−1
for NGC 6264). Tightening of the error bars as more megamasers are discovered, together with
careful modelling, are likely to allow this project to make the cleanest determination of the Hubble
constant within the next five years.

2.2 Gravitational lenses

A general review of gravitational lensing is given by Wambsganss [233]; here we review the theory
necessary for an understanding of the use of lenses in determining the Hubble constant. This
determination, like the megamaser method, is a one-step process, although at a much greater
distance. It is thus interesting both as a complementary determination and as an opportunity
to determine the Hubble parameter as a function of redshift. It has the drawback of possessing
one serious systematic error associated with contaminating astrophysics, namely the detailed mass
model of the lens.

2.2.1 Basics of lensing

Light is bent by the action of a gravitational field. In the case where a galaxy lies close to the line
of sight to a background quasar, the quasar’s light may travel along several different paths to the
observer, resulting in more than one image.
The easiest way to visualise this is to begin with a zero-mass galaxy (which bends no light
rays) acting as the lens, and considering all possible light paths from the quasar to the observer
which have a bend in the lens plane. From the observer’s point of view, we can connect all paths
which take the same time to reach the observer with a contour in the lens plane, which in this
case is circular in shape. The image will form at the centre of the diagram, surrounded by circles
representing increasing light travel times. This is of course an application of Fermat’s principle;
images form at stationary points in the Fermat surface, in this case at the Fermat minimum. Put
less technically, the light has taken a straight-line path8 between the source and observer.
If we now allow the galaxy to have a steadily increasing mass, we introduce an extra time delay
(known as the Shapiro delay) along light paths which pass through the lens plane close to the
galaxy centre. This makes a distortion in the Fermat surface (Figure 3). At first, its only effect
is to displace the Fermat minimum away from the distortion. Eventually, however, the distortion
becomes big enough to produce a maximum at the position of the galaxy, together with a saddle
point on the other side of the galaxy from the minimum. By Fermat’s principle, two further images
will appear at these two stationary points in the Fermat surface. This is the basic three-image lens
configuration, although in practice the central image at the Fermat maximum is highly demagnified
and not usually seen.
If the lens is significantly elliptical and the lines of sight are well aligned, we can produce five
images, consisting of four images around a ring alternating between maxima and saddle points, and
a central, highly demagnified Fermat maximum. Both four-image and two-image systems (“quads”
and “doubles”) are in fact seen in practice. The major use of lens systems is for determining mass
distributions in the lens galaxy, since the positions and fluxes of the images carry information about
the gravitational potential of the lens. Gravitational lensing has the advantage that its effects are
8 Strictly speaking, provided we ignore effects to do with curvature of the Universe.

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The Hubble Constant 13

independent of whether the matter is light or dark, so in principle the effects of both baryonic and
non-baryonic matter can be probed.

Figure 3: Illustration of a Fermat surface for a source (red symbol) close to the line of sight to a galaxy
(green symbol). In each case the appearance of the images to the observer is shown by a greyscale, and the
contours of the Fermat surface are given by green contours. Note that images form at stationary points of
the surface defined by the contours. In the three panels, the mass of the galaxy, and thus the distortion
of the Fermat surface, increases, resulting in an increasingly visible secondary image at the position of the
saddle point. At the same time, the primary image moves further from the line of sight to the source. In
each case the third image, at the position of the Fermat maximum, is too faint to see.

2.2.2 Principles of time delays

Refsdal [166] pointed out that if the background source is variable, it is possible to measure an
absolute distance within the system and therefore the Hubble constant. To see how this works,
consider the light paths from the source to the observer corresponding to the individual lensed
images. Although each is at a stationary point in the Fermat time delay surface, the absolute light
travel time for each will generally be different, with one of the Fermat minima having the smallest
travel time. Therefore, if the source brightens, this brightening will reach the observer at different
times corresponding to the two different light paths. Measurement of the time delay corresponds
to measuring the difference in the light travel times, each of which is individually given by
(︂ )︂
𝐷l 𝐷s 1 2
𝜏= (1 + 𝑧l ) (𝜃 − 𝛽) − 𝜓(𝜃) , (11)
𝑐𝐷ls 2
where 𝛼, 𝛽 and 𝜃 are angles defined below in Figure 4, 𝐷l , 𝐷s and 𝐷ls are angular diameter
distances also defined in Figure 4, 𝑧l is the lens redshift, and 𝜓(𝜃) is a term representing the
Shapiro delay of light passing through a gravitational field. Fermat’s principle corresponds to the
requirement that ∇𝜏 = 0. Once the differential time delays are known, we can then calculate the
ratio of angular diameter distances which appears in the above equation. If the source and lens
redshifts are known, 𝐻0 follows from Eqs. 9 and 10. The value derived depends on the geometric
cosmological parameters Ω𝑚 and ΩΛ , but this dependence is relatively weak. A handy rule of
thumb which can be derived from this equation for the case of a 2-image lens, if we make the
assumption that the matter distribution is isothermal9 and 𝐻0 = 70 km s−1 Mpc−1 , is
(︂ )︂
𝑓 −1 2
Δ𝜏 = (14 days)(1 + 𝑧l )𝐷 𝑠 , (12)
𝑓 +1
9 An isothermal model is one in which the projected surface mass density decreases as 1/𝑟. An isothermal galaxy

will have a flat rotation curve, as is observed in many galaxies.

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14 Neal Jackson

where 𝑧l is the lens redshift, 𝑠 is the separation of the images (approximately twice the Einstein
radius), 𝑓 > 1 is the ratio of the fluxes and 𝐷 is the value of 𝐷s 𝐷l /𝐷ls in Gpc. A larger time delay
implies a correspondingly lower 𝐻0 .

Figure 4: Basic geometry of a gravitational lens system. Image reproduced from [233]; copyright by the
author.

The first gravitational lens was discovered in 1979 [232] and monitoring programmes began soon
afterwards to determine the time delay. This turned out to be a long process involving a dispute
between proponents of a ∼ 400-day and a ∼ 550-day delay, and ended with a determination of
417 ± 2 days [121, 189]. Since that time, over 20 more time delays have been determined (see
Table 1). In the early days, many of the time delays were measured at radio wavelengths by
examination of those systems in which a radio-loud quasar was the multiply imaged source (see
Figure 5). Recently, optically-measured delays have dominated, due to the fact that only a small
optical telescope in a site with good seeing is needed for the photometric monitoring, whereas radio
time delays require large amounts of time on long-baseline interferometers which do not exist in
large numbers.10 A time delay using 𝛾-rays has been determined for one lens [37] using correlated
variations in a light-curve which contains emission from both images of the lens.

2.2.3 The problem with lens time delays

Unlike local distance determinations (and even unlike cosmological probes which typically use
more than one measurement), there is only one major systematic piece of astrophysics in the
determination of 𝐻0 by lenses, but it is a very important one.11 This is the form of the potential
in Eq. (11). If one parametrises the potential in the form of a power law in projected mass density
10 Essentially all radio time delays have come from the VLA, although monitoring programmes with MERLIN

have also been attempted.

11 The redshifts of the lens and source also need to be known, as does the position of the centre of the lens galaxy;

this measurement is not always a trivial proposition [241].

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The Hubble Constant 15

8 1st flares Fermi ToO

2nd delay
Fγ (10 photons cm s )
−2 −1

6 2nd flares
1st delay

4
−6

0
80 90 100 110 120 130
T (MJD − 56100 days)

Figure 5: The lens system JVAS B0218+357. Top right: the measurement of time delay of about
10 days from asynchronous variations of the two lensed images [16]. The upper left panels show the
HST/ACS image [241] on which can be seen the two images and the spiral lensing galaxy, and the radio
MERLIN+VLA image [17] showing the two images together with an Einstein ring. The bottom panel
shows the 𝛾-ray lightcurve [37], in which, although the components are not resolved, the sharpness of the
variations allows a time delay to be determined (at 11.46 ± 0.16 days, significantly greater than the radio
time delay). Image reproduced with permission from [37]; copyright by AAS.

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16 Neal Jackson

versus radius, the index is −1 for an isothermal model. This index has a pretty direct degeneracy12
with the deduced length scale and therefore the Hubble constant; for a change of 0.1, the length
scale changes by about 10%. The sense of the effect is that a steeper index, which corresponds
to a more centrally concentrated mass distribution, decreases all the length scales and therefore
implies a higher Hubble constant for a given time delay.
If an uncertainty in the slope of a power-law mass distribution were the only issue, then this
could be constrained by lensing observables in the case where the source is extended, resulting
in measurements of lensed structure at many different points in the lens plane [115]. This has
been done, for example, using multiple radio sources [38], VLBI radio structure [239] and in many
objects using lensed structure of background galaxies [21], although in this latter case 𝐻0 is not
measurable because the background objects are not variable. The degeneracy between the Hubble
constant and the mass model is more general than this, however [76]. The reason is that lensing
observables give information about the derivatives of the Fermat surface; the positions of the images
are determined by the first derivatives of the surface, and the fluxes by the second derivatives. For
any given set of lensing observables, we can move the intrinsic source position, thus changing the
Fermat surface, and then restore the observables to their original values by adjusting the mass
model and thus returning the Fermat surface to its original configuration. It therefore follows that
any given set of measurements of image positions and fluxes in a lens system is consistent with a
number of different mass models, and therefore a number of different values of 𝐻0 , because the
source position cannot be determined. Therefore the assumption of a particular type of model,
such as a power-law, itself constitutes a selection of a particular one out of a range of possible
models [192], each of which would give a different 𝐻0 . Modelling degeneracies arise not only from
the mass distribution within the lens galaxy, but also from matter along the line of sight. These
operate in the sense that, if a mass sheet is present which is not known about, the length scale
obtained is too short and consequently the derived value of 𝐻0 is too high.
There are a number of approaches to this mass-degeneracy problem. The first is to use a
non-parametric model for the projected mass distribution, imposing only a minimum number of
physically-motivated requirements such as monotonicity, and thereby generate large numbers of
mass models which are exactly consistent with the data. This was pioneered by Saha and Williams
in a series of papers [179, 237, 180, 177] in which pixellated models of galaxy mass distributions
were used. Although pixellated models are useful for exploring the space of allowed models, they do
not break the essential degeneracy. Other priors may be used, however: in principle it should also
be possible to reject some possible mass distributions on physical grounds, because we expect the
mass profiles to contain a central stellar cusp and a more extended dark matter halo. Undisturbed
dark matter haloes should have profiles similar to a Navarro, Frenk & White (NFW, [139]) form,
but they may be modified by adiabatic contraction during the process of baryonic infall when the
galaxy forms.
Second, it is possible to increase the reliability of individual lens mass models by gathering
extra information which partially breaks the mass degeneracy. A major improvement is available
by the use of stellar velocity dispersions [221, 220, 222, 119] measured in the lensing galaxy.
As a standalone determinant of mass models in galaxies at 𝑧 ∼ 0.5, typical of lens galaxies, such
measurements are not very useful as they suffer from severe degeneracies with the structure of stellar
orbits. However, the combination of lensing information (which gives a very accurate measurement
of mass enclosed by the Einstein radius) and stellar dynamics (which gives, more or less, the mass
enclosed within the effective radius of the stellar light) gives a measurement that in effect selects
only some of the family of possible lens models which fit a given set of lensing observables. The
12 As discussed extensively in [113, 117], this is not a global degeneracy, but arises because the lensed images tell
you about the mass distribution in the annulus centred on the galaxy and with inner and outer radii defined by
the inner and outer images. Kochanek [113] derives detailed expressions for the time delay in terms of the central
underlying and controlling parameter, the surface density in this annulus [76].

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The Hubble Constant 17

method has large error bars, in part due to residual dependencies on the shape of stellar orbits,
but also because these measurements are very difficult; each galaxy requires about one night of
good seeing on a 10-m telescope. Nevertheless, this programme has the potential beneficial effect
of reducing the dominant systematic error, despite the potential additional systematic from the
assumptions about stellar orbits.
Third, we can remove problems associated with mass sheets associated with material extrinsic
to the main lensing galaxy by measuring them using detailed studies of the environments of lens
galaxies. Studies of lens groups [60, 106, 59, 137] show that neglecting matter along the line of sight
typically has an effect of 10 – 20%, with matter close to the redshift of the lens contributing most.
More recently, it has been shown that a combination of studies of number counts and redshifts of
nearby objects to the main lens galaxy, coupled with comparisons to large numerical simulations
of matter such as the Millenium Simulation, can reduce the errors associated with the environment
to around 3 – 4% [78].

2.2.4 Time delay measurements

Table 1 shows the currently measured time delays, with references and comments. The addition
of new measurements is now occurring at a much faster rate, due to the advent of more system-
atic dedicated monitoring programmes, in particular that of the COSMOGRAIL collaboration
(e.g., [230, 231, 41, 164, 57]). Considerable patience is needed for these efforts in order to deter-
mine an unambiguous delay for any given object, given the contaminating effects of microlensing
and also the unavoidable gaps in the monitoring schedule (at least for optical monitoring pro-
grammes) once per year as the objects move into the daytime. Derivation of time delays under
these circumstances is not a trivial matter, and algorithms which can cope with these effects have
been under continuous development for decades [156, 114, 88, 217] culminating in a blind analysis
challenge [50].

2.2.5 Derivation of H 0 : Now, and the future

Initially, time delays were usually turned into Hubble constant values using assumptions about the
mass model – usually that of a single, isothermal power law [119] – and with rudimentary modelling
of the environment of the lens system as necessary. Early analyses of this type resulted in rather
low values of the Hubble constant [112] for some systems, sometimes due to the steepness of the lens
potential [221]. As the number of measured time delays expanded, combined analyses of multiple
lens systems were conducted, often assuming parametric lens models [141] but also using Monte
Carlo methods to account for quantities such as the presence of clusters around the main lens. These
methods typically give values around 70 km s−1 Mpc−1 – e.g., (68 ± 6 ± 8) km s−1 Mpc−1 from
Oguri (2007) [141], but with an uncomfortably greater spread between lens systems than would
be expected on the basis of the formal errors. An alternative approach to composite modelling is
to use non-parametric lens models, on the grounds that these may permit a wider range of mass
distributions [177, 150] even though they also contain some level of prior assumptions. Saha et
al. (2006) [177] used ten time-delay lenses for this purpose, and Paraficz et al. (2010) [150] extended
−1
the analysis to eighteen systems obtaining 66+6−4 km s Mpc−1 , with a further extension by Sereno
& Paraficz (2014) [194] giving 66 ± 6 ± 4 (stat/syst) km s−1 Mpc−1 .
In the last few years, concerted attempts have emerged to put together improved time-delay
observations with systematic modelling. For two existing time-delay lenses (CLASS B1608+656
and RXJ 1131–1231) modelling has been undertaken [205, 206] using a combination of all of
the previously described ingredients: stellar velocity dispersions to constrain the lens model and
partly break the mass degeneracy, multi-band HST imaging to evaluate and model the extended
light distribution of the lensed object, comparison with numerical simulations to gauge the likely

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18 Neal Jackson

Table 1: Time delays, with 1-𝜎 errors, from the literature. In some cases multiple delays have been
measured in 4-image lens systems, and in this case each delay is given separately for the two components
in brackets. An additional time delay for CLASS B1422+231 [151] probably requires verification, and a
published time delay for Q0142–100 [120, 146] has large errors. Time delays for the CLASS and PKS
objects have been obtained using radio interferometers, and the remainder using optical telescopes.

Lens system Time delay Reference

[days]

CLASS 0218+357 10.5 ± 0.2 [16]

HE 0435-1-223 14.4+0.8
−0.9 (AD) [116]
7.8 ± 0.8 (BC) also others [41]
SBS 0909+532 45+1
−11 (2𝜎) [229]
RX 0911+0551 146 ± 4 [86]
FBQ 0951+2635 16 ± 2 [103]
Q 0957+561 417 ± 3 [121]
SDSS 1001+5027 119.3 ± 3.3 [164]
SDSS 1004+4112 38.4 ± 2.0 (AB) [65]
SDSS 1029+2623 [64]
HE 1104–185 161 ± 7 [140]
PG 1115+080 23.7 ± 3.4 (BC) [188]
9.4 ± 3.4 (AC)
RX 1131–1231 12.0+1.5
−1.3 (AB) [138]
9.6+2.0
−1.6 (AC)
87 ± 8 (AD)
[217]
SDSS J1206+4332 111.3 ± 3 [57]
SBS 1520+530 130 ± 3 [30]
CLASS 1600+434 51 ± 2 [28]
47+5
−6 [118]
CLASS 1608+656 31.5+2
−1 (AB) [61]
+1
36−2 (BC)
77+2
−1 (BD)
SDSS 1650+4251 49.5 ± 1.9 [230]
PKS 1830–211 26+4
−5 [127]
WFI J2033–4723 35.5 ± 1.4 (AB) [231]
HE 2149–2745 103 ± 12 [29]
HS 2209+1914 20.0 ± 5 [57]
Q 2237+0305 2.7+0.5
−0.9 h [44]

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The Hubble Constant 19

contribution of the line of sight to the lensing potential, and the performance of the analysis
blind (without sight of the consequences for 𝐻0 of any decision taken during the modelling). The
−1
results of the two lenses together, 75.2+4.4 +2.4
−4.2 and 73.1−3.6 km s Mpc−1 in flat and open ΛCDM,
respectively, are probably the most reliable determinations of 𝐻0 from lensing to date, even if they
do not have the lowest formal error13 .
In the immediate future, the most likely advances come from further analysis of existing time
delay lenses, although the process of obtaining the data for good quality time delays and constraints
on the mass model is not a quick process. A number of further developments will expedite the
process. The first is the likely discovery of lenses on an industrial scale using the Large Synoptic
Survey Telescope (LSST, [101]) and the Euclid satellite [4], together with time delays produced
by high cadence monitoring. The second is the availability in a few years’ time of > 8-m class
optical telescopes, which will ease the followup problem considerably. A third possibility which
has been discussed in the past is the use of double source-plane lenses, in which two background
objects, one of which is a quasar, are imaged by a single foreground object [74, 39]. Unfortunately,
it appears [191] that even this additional set of constraints leave the mass degeneracy intact,
although it remains to be seen whether dynamical information will help relatively more in these
objects than in single-plane systems.
One potentially clean way to break mass model degeneracies is to discover a lensed type Ia
supernova [142, 143]. The reason is that, as we have seen, the intrinsic brightness of SNe Ia can
be determined from their lightcurve, and it can be shown that the resulting absolute magnification
of the images can then be used to bypass the effective degeneracy between the Hubble constant
and the radial mass slope. Oguri et al. [143] and also Bolton and Burles [20] discuss prospects for
finding such objects; future surveys with the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) are likely
to uncover significant numbers of such events. The problem is likely to be the determination of
the time delay, since nearly all such objects are subject to significant microlensing effects within
the lensing galaxy which is likely to restrict the accuracy of the measurement [51].

2.3 The Sunyaev–Zel’dovich effect

The basic principle of the Sunyaev–Zel’dovich (S-Z) method [203], including its use to determine
the Hubble constant [196], is reviewed in detail in [18, 33]. It is based on the physics of hot (108 K)
gas in clusters, which emits X-rays by bremsstrahlung emission with a surface brightness given by
the equation (see e.g., [18]) ∫︁
1
𝑏X = 𝑛2𝑒 Λ𝑒 d𝑙 , (13)
4𝜋(1 + 𝑧)3
where 𝑛𝑒 is the electron density and Λ𝑒 the spectral emissivity, which depends on the electron
temperature.
At the same time, the electrons of the hot gas in the cluster Compton upscatter photons from
the CMB radiation. At radio frequencies below the peak of the Planck distribution, this causes a
“hole” in radio emission as photons are removed from this spectral region and turned into higher-
frequency photons (see Figure 6). The decrement is given by an optical-depth equation,
∫︁
Δ𝐼(𝜈) = 𝐼0 𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑇 Ψ(𝜈, 𝑇𝑒 ) d𝑙 , (14)

involving many of the same parameters and a function Ψ which depends on frequency and electron
temperature. It follows that, if both 𝑏X and Δ𝐼(𝑥) can be measured, we have two equations for
the variables 𝑛𝑒 and the integrated length 𝑙‖ through the cluster and can calculate both quantities.
13 The programme, known as H0LiCOW, is now continuing in order to measure time delays, improve models and

derive further 𝐻0 values for more lenses.

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20 Neal Jackson

Finally, if we assume that the projected size 𝑙⊥ of the cluster on the sky is equal to 𝑙‖ , we can
then derive an angular diameter distance if we know the angular size of the cluster. The Hubble
constant is then easy to calculate, given the redshift of the cluster.

Figure 6: S-Z decrement observation of Abell 697 with the Ryle telescope in contours superimposed on
the ROSAT image (grey-scale). Image reproduced with permission from [104]; copyright by RAS.

Although in principle a clean, single-step method, in practice there are a number of possible
difficulties. Firstly, the method involves two measurements, each with a list of possible errors.
The X-ray determination carries a calibration uncertainty and an uncertainty due to absorption
by neutral hydrogen along the line of sight. The radio observation, as well as the calibration, is
subject to possible errors due to subtraction of radio sources within the cluster which are unrelated
to the S-Z effect. Next, and probably most importantly, are the errors associated with the cluster
modelling. In order to extract parameters such as electron temperature, we need to model the
physics of the X-ray cluster. This is not as difficult as it sounds, because X-ray spectral information
is usually available, and line ratio measurements give diagnostics of physical parameters. For this
modelling the cluster is usually assumed to be in hydrostatic equilibrium, or a “beta-model” (a
dependence of electron density with radius of the form 𝑛(𝑟) = 𝑛0 (1 + 𝑟2 /𝑟c2 )−3𝛽/2 ) is assumed.
Several recent works [190, 22] relax this assumption, instead constraining the profile of the cluster
with available X-ray information, and the dependence of 𝐻0 on these details is often reassuringly
small (< 10%). Finally, the cluster selection can be done carefully to avoid looking at prolate
clusters along the long axis (for which 𝑙⊥ ̸= 𝑙‖ ) and therefore seeing more X-rays than one would
predict. This can be done by avoiding clusters close to the flux limit of X-ray flux-limited samples,
Reese et al. [165] estimate an overall random error budget of 20 – 30% for individual clusters. As
in the case of gravitational lenses, the problem then becomes the relatively trivial one of making
more measurements, provided there are no unforeseen systematics.
The cluster samples of the most recent S-Z determinations (see Table 2) are not independent in
that different authors often observe the same clusters. The most recent work, that in [22] is larger
than the others and gives a higher 𝐻0 . It is worth noting, however, that if we draw subsamples from
this work and compare the results with the other S-Z work, the 𝐻0 values from the subsamples are

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The Hubble Constant 21

Table 2: Some recent measurements of 𝐻0 using the S-Z effect. Model types are 𝛽 for the assumption of
a 𝛽-model and H for a hydrostatic equilibrium model. Some of the studies target the same clusters, with
three objects being common to more than one of the four smaller studies, The larger study [22] contains
four of the objects from [104] and two from [190].

Reference Number of clusters Model type 𝐻0 determination

[km s−1 Mpc−1 ]

[22] 38 𝛽+H 76.9+3.9+10.0

−3.4−8.0

[104] 5 𝛽 66+11+9
−10−8

[228] 7 𝛽 67+30+15
−18−6

[190] 3 H 69 ± 8
[131] 7 𝛽 66+14+15
−11−15

[165] 18 𝛽 60+4+13
−4−18

consistent. For example, the 𝐻0 derived from the data in [22] and modelling of the five clusters
also considered in [104] is actually lower than the value of 66 km s−1 Mpc−1 in [104]. Within the
smaller samples, the scatter is much lower than the quoted errors, partially due to the overlap in
samples (three objects are common to more than one of the four smaller studies).
It therefore seems as though S-Z determinations of the Hubble constant are beginning to con-
verge to a value of around 70 km s−1 Mpc−1 , although the errors are still large, values in the low
to mid-sixties are still consistent with the data and it is possible that some objects may have been
observed but not used to derive a published 𝐻0 value. Even more than in the case of gravitational
lenses, measurements of 𝐻0 from individual clusters are occasionally discrepant by factors of nearly
two in either direction, and it would probably teach us interesting astrophysics to investigate these
cases further.

2.4 Gamma-ray propagation

High-energy 𝛾-rays emitted by distant AGN are subject to interactions with ambient photons
during their passage towards us, producing electron-positron pairs. The mean free path for this
process varies with photon energy, being smaller at higher energies, and is generally a substantial
fraction of the distance to the sources. The observed spectrum of 𝛾-ray sources therefore shows a
high-energy cutoff, whose characteristic energy decreases with increasing redshift. The expected
cutoff, and its dependence on redshift, has been detected with the Fermi satellite [1].
The details of this effect depend on the Hubble constant, and can therefore be used to measure
it [183, 11]. Because it is an optical depth effect, knowledge of the interaction cross-section from
basic physics, together with the number density 𝑛𝑝 of the interacting photons, allows a length mea-
surement and, assuming knowledge of the redshift of the source, 𝐻0 . In practice, the cosmological
world model is also needed to determine 𝑛𝑝 from observables. From the existing Fermi data a
value of 72 km s−1 Mpc−1 is estimated [52] although the errors, dominated by the calculation of
the evolution of the extragalactic background light using galaxy luminosity functions and spectral
energy distributions, are currently quite large (∼ 10 km s−1 Mpc−1 ).

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22 Neal Jackson

3 Local Distance Ladder

3.1 Preliminary remarks
As we have seen, in principle a single object whose spectrum reveals its recession velocity, and
whose distance or luminosity is accurately known, gives a measurement of the Hubble constant.
In practice, the object must be far enough away for the dominant contribution to the motion to
be the velocity associated with the general expansion of the Universe (the “Hubble flow”), as this
expansion velocity increases linearly with distance whereas other nuisance velocities, arising from
gravitational interaction with nearby matter, do not. For nearby galaxies, motions associated with
the potential of the local environment are about 200 – 300 km s−1 , requiring us to measure dis-
tances corresponding to recession velocities of a few thousand km s−1 or greater. These recession
velocities correspond to distances of at least a few tens of Mpc.
The Cepheid distance method, used since the original papers by Hubble, has therefore been to
measure distances of nearby objects and use this knowledge to calibrate the brightness of more
distant objects compared to the nearby ones. This process must be repeated several times in order
to bootstrap one’s way out to tens of Mpc, and has been the subject of many reviews and books
(see e.g., [176]). The process has a long and tortuous history, with many controversies and false
turnings, and which as a by-product included the discovery of a large amount of stellar astrophysics.
The astrophysical content of the method is a disadvantage, because errors in our understanding
propagate directly into errors in the distance scale and consequently the Hubble constant. The
number of steps involved is also a disadvantage, as it allows opportunities for both random and
systematic errors to creep into the measurement. It is probably fair to say that some of these
errors are still not universally agreed on. The range of recent estimates is in the low seventies of
km s−1 Mpc−1 , with the errors having shrunk by a factor of two in the last ten years, and the
reasons for the disagreements (in many cases by different analysis of essentially the same data) are
often quite complex.

3.2 Basic principle

We first outline the method briefly, before discussing each stage in more detail. Nearby stars
have a reliable distance measurement in the form of the parallax effect. This effect arises because
the earth’s motion around the sun produces an apparent shift in the position of nearby stars
compared to background stars at much greater distances. The shift has a period of a year, and an
angular amplitude on the sky of the Earth-Sun distance divided by the distance to the star. The
definition of the parsec is the distance which gives a parallax of one arcsecond, and is equivalent
to 3.26 light-years, or 3.09 × 1016 m. The field of parallax measurement was revolutionised by the
Hipparcos satellite, which measured thousands of stellar parallax distances, including observations
of 223 Galactic Cepheids; of the Cepheids, 26 yielded determinations of reasonable significance [63].
The Gaia satellite will increase these by a large factor, probably observing thousands of Galactic
Cepheids and giving accurate distances as well as colours and metallicities [225].
Some relatively nearby stars exist in clusters of a few hundred stars known as “open clusters”.
These stars can be plotted on a Hertzsprung–Russell diagram of temperature, deduced from their
colour together with Wien’s law, against apparent luminosity. Such plots reveal a characteristic
sequence, known as the “main sequence” which ranges from red, faint stars to blue, bright stars.
This sequence corresponds to the main phase of stellar evolution which stars occupy for most of
their lives when they are stably burning hydrogen. In some nearby clusters, notably the Hyades, we
have stars all at the same distance and for which parallax effects can give the absolute distance to
<1% [159]. In such cases, the main sequence can be calibrated so that we can predict the absolute
luminosity of a main-sequence star of a given colour. Applying this to other clusters, a process

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The Hubble Constant 23

known as “main sequence fitting”, can also give the absolute distance to these other clusters; the
errors involved in this fitting process appear to be of the order of a few percent [5].
The next stage of the bootstrap process is to determine the distance to the nearest objects
outside our own Galaxy, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. For this we can apply the
open-cluster method directly, by observing open clusters in the LMC. Alternatively, we can use
calibrators whose true luminosity we know, or can predict from their other properties. Such
calibrators must be present in the LMC and also in open clusters (or must be close enough for
their parallaxes to be directly measurable).
These calibrators include Mira variables, RR Lyrae stars and Cepheid variable stars, of which
Cepheids are intrinsically the most luminous. All of these have variability periods which are
correlated with their absolute luminosity (Section 1.1), and in principle the measurement of the
distance of a nearby object of any of these types can then be used to determine distances to more
distant similar objects simply by observing and comparing the variability periods.
The LMC lies at about 50 kpc, about three orders of magnitude less than that of the distant
galaxies of interest for the Hubble constant. However, one class of variable stars, Cepheid variables,
can be seen in both the LMC and in galaxies at distances up to 20 – 30 Mpc. The coming of the
Hubble Space Telescope has been vital for this process, as only with the HST can Cepheids be
reliably identified and measured in such galaxies.
Even the HST galaxies containing Cepheids are not sufficient to allow the measurement of
the universal expansion, because they are not distant enough for the dominant velocity to be the
Hubble flow. The final stage is to use galaxies with distances measured with Cepheid variables
to calibrate other indicators which can be measured to cosmologically interesting distances. The
most promising indicator consists of type Ia supernovae (SNe), which are produced by binary
systems in which a giant star is dumping mass on to a white dwarf which has already gone
through its evolutionary process and collapsed to an electron-degenerate remnant; at a critical
point, the rate and amount of mass dumping is sufficient to trigger a supernova explosion. The
physics of the explosion, and hence the observed light-curve of the rise and slow fall, has the same
characteristic regardless of distance. Although the absolute luminosity of the explosion is not
constant, type Ia supernovae have similar light-curves [163, 8, 209] and in particular there is a very
good correlation between the peak brightness and the degree of fading of the supernova 15 days14
after peak brightness (a quantity known as Δ𝑚15 [162, 82]). If SNe Ia can be detected in galaxies
with known Cepheid distances, this correlation can be calibrated and used to determine distances
to any other galaxy in which a SN Ia is detected. Because of the brightness of supernovae, they
can be observed at large distances and hence, finally, a comparison between redshift and distance
will give a value of the Hubble constant.
There are alternative indicators which can be used instead of SNe Ia for determination of 𝐻0 ; all
of them rely on the correlation of some easily observable property of galaxies with their luminosity
or size, thus allowing them to be used as standard candles or rulers respectively. For example, the
edge-on rotation velocity 𝑣 of spiral galaxies scales with luminosity as 𝐿 ∝ 𝑣 4 , a scaling known as
the Tully–Fisher relation [224]. There is an equivalent for elliptical galaxies, known as the Faber–
Jackson relation [58]. In practice, more complex combinations of observed properties are often
used such as the 𝐷𝑛 parameter of [53] and [128], to generate measurable properties of elliptical
galaxies which correlate well with luminosity, or the “fundamental plane” [53, 49] between three
properties, the average surface brightness within an effective radius15 the effective radius 𝑟𝑒 , and
the central stellar velocity dispersion 𝜎. Here we can measure surface brightnesses and 𝜎 and derive
a standard ruler in terms of the true 𝑟𝑒 which can then be compared with the apparent size of the
galaxy.
14 Because of the expansion of the Universe, there is a time dilation of a factor (1 + 𝑧)−1 which must be applied

to timescales measured at cosmological distances before these are used for such comparisons.
15 The effective radius is the radius from within which half the galaxy’s light is emitted.

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24 Neal Jackson

Figure 7: Positions of Cepheid variables in HST/ACS observations of the galaxy NGC 4258. Typical
Cepheid lightcurves are shown on the top. Image reproduced with permission from [129]; copyright by
AAS.

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The Hubble Constant 25

A somewhat different indicator relies on the fact that the degree to which stars within galaxies
are resolved depends on distance, in the sense that closer galaxies have more statistical “bumpiness”
in the surface-brightness distribution [219] because of the degree to which Poisson fluctuations in
the stellar surface density are visible. This method of surface brightness fluctuation can also be
calibrated by Cepheid variables in the nearer galaxies.

3.3 Problems and comments

3.3.1 Distance to the LMC
The LMC distance is probably the best-known, and least controversial, part of the distance ladder.
Some methods of determination are summarised in [62]; independent calibrations using RR Lyrae
variables, Cepheids and open clusters, are consistent with a distance of ∼ 50 kpc. An early
measurement, independent of all of the above, was made by [149] using the type II supernova
SN 1987A in the LMC. This supernova produced an expanding ring whose angular diameter could
be measured using the HST. An absolute size for the ring could also be deduced by monitoring
ultraviolet emission lines in the ring and using light travel time arguments, and the distance of
51.2 ± 3.1 kpc followed from comparison of the two. An extension to this light-echo method was
proposed in [200] which exploits the fact that the maximum in polarization in scattered light is
obtained when the scattering angle is 90∘ . Hence, if a supernova light echo were observed in
polarized light, its distance would be unambiguously calculated by comparing the light-echo time
and the angular radius of the polarized ring.
More traditional calibration methods traditionally resulted in distance moduli to the LMC of
𝜇0 ≃ 18.50 (defined as 5 log 𝑑 − 5, where 𝑑 is the distance in parsecs) corresponding to a distance
of ≃ 50 kpc. In particular, developments in the use of standard-candle stars, main sequence
fitting and the details of SN 1987A are reviewed by [3] who concludes that 𝜇0 = 18.50 ± 0.02.
This has recently been revised downwards slightly using a more direct calibration using parallax
measurements of Galactic Cepheids [14] to calibrate the zero-point of the Cepheid P-L relation in
the LMC [68]. A value of 𝜇0 = 18.40 ± 0.01 is found by these authors, corresponding to a distance
of 47.9 ± 0.2 kpc. The likely corresponding error in 𝐻0 is well below the level of systematic errors
in other parts of the distance ladder. This LMC distance also agrees well with the value needed
in order to make the Cepheid distance to NGC 4258 agree with the maser distance ([129], see also
Section 4).

3.3.2 Cepheid systematics

The details of the calibration of the Cepheid period-luminosity relation have historically caused the
most difficulties in the local calibration of the Hubble constant. There are a number of minor effects,
which can be estimated and calibrated relatively easy, and a dependence on metallicity which is a
systematic problem upon which a lot of effort has been spent and which is now considerably better
understood.
One example of a minor difficulty is a selection bias in Cepheid programmes; faint Cepheids are
harder to see. Combined with the correlation between luminosity and period, this means that only
the brighter short-period Cepheids are seen, and therefore that the P-L relation in distant galaxies
is made artificially shallow [186] resulting in underestimates of distances. Neglect of this bias can
give differences of several percent in the answer, and detailed simulations of it have been carried
out by Teerikorpi and collaborators (e.g., [214, 152, 153, 154]). Most authors correct explicitly
for this problem – for example, [71] calculate the correction analytically and find a maximum bias
of about 3%. Teerikorpi & Paturel suggest that a residual bias may still be present, essentially
because the amplitude of variation introduces an additional scatter in brightness at a given period,
in addition to the scatter in intrinsic luminosity. How big this bias is is hard to quantify, although

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26 Neal Jackson

it can in principle be eliminated by using only long-period Cepheids at the cost of increases in the
random error.
The major systematic difficulty became apparent in studies of the biggest sample of Cepheid
variables, which arises from the OGLE microlensing survey of the LMC [227]. Samples of Galactic
Cepheids have been studied by many authors [62, 75, 67, 10, 13, 108], and their distances can
be calibrated by the methods previously described, or by using lunar-occultation measurements
of stellar angular diameters [66] together with stellar temperatures to determine distances by
Stefan’s law [236, 9]. Comparison of the P-L relations for Galactic and LMC Cepheids, however,
show significant dissimilarities. In all three HST colours (𝐵, 𝑉 , 𝐼) the slope of the relations are
different, in the sense that Galactic Cepheids are brighter than LMC Cepheids at long periods
and are fainter at short periods. The two samples are of equal brightness in 𝐵 at a period of
approximately 30 days, and at a period of a little more than 10 days in 𝐼.16
The culprit for this discrepancy is mainly metallicity17 differences in the Cepheids, which in
turn results from the fact that the LMC is more metal-poor than the Galaxy. Unfortunately, many
of the external galaxies which are to be used for distance determination are likely to be similar
in metallicity to the Galaxy, but the best local information on Cepheids for calibration purposes
comes from the LMC. On average, the Galactic Cepheids tabulated by [81] are of approximately
of solar metallicity, whereas those of the LMC are approximately 0.6 dex less metallic. If these
two samples are compared with their independently derived distances, a correlation of brightness
with metallicity appears with a slope of −0.8 ± 0.3 mag dex−1 using only Galactic Cepheids, and
−0.27 ± 0.08 mag dex−1 using both samples together. This can cause differences of 10 – 15% in
inferred distance if the effect is ignored.
Many areas of historic disagreement can be traced back to how this correction is done. In partic-
ular, two different 2005 – 2006 estimates of 73±4 (statistical) ±5 (systematic) km s−1 Mpc−1 [170]
and 62.3 ± 1.3 (statistical) ±5 (systematic) km s−1 Mpc−1 [187], both based on the same Cepheid
photometry from the HST Key Project[178] and essentially the same Cepheid P-L relation for the
LMC [218] have their origin mainly in this effect.18 One can apply a global correction for metallic-
ity differences between the LMC and the galaxies in which the Cepheids are measured by the HST
Key Project [181], or attempt to interpolate between LMC and Galactic P-L relations [211] using
a period-dependent metallicity correction [187]. The differences in this correction account for the
10 – 15% difference in the resulting value of 𝐻0 .
More recently, a number of different solutions for this problem have been found, which are
summarised in the review by [68] and many of which involve getting rid of the intermediate LMC
step using other calibrations. [129] use ACS observations of Cepheids in the galaxy NGC 4258,
which has a well-determined distance using maser observations (Section 4, [99, 80, 100]), and whose
Cepheids have a range of metallicities[242]. Analysis of these Cepheids suggests that the use of a
P-L relation whose slope varies with metallicity [211, 187] overcorrects at long period. Because of
the known maser distance, these Cepheids can then be used both to determine the LMC distance
independently [129] and also to calibrate the SNe distance scale and hence determine 𝐻0 [173, 172].
The estimate has been incrementally improved by several methods in the last few years
Values obtained for the Hubble constant using the NGC 4258 calibration are quoted by [174]
as 74.8 ± 3.1 km s−1 Mpc−1 , using a value of 7.28 Mpc as the NGC 4258 distance. This was later
corrected by [100], who find a distance of 7.60 ± 0.17 (stat) ±0.15 (sys) Mpc using more VLBI
epochs, together with better modelling of the masers, which therefore yields a Hubble constant
of 72.0 ± 3.0 km s−1 Mpc−1 . Efstathiou [54] has argued for further modifications, with different
16 Nearly all Cepheids measured in galaxies containing SN Ia have periods > 20 days, so the usual sense of the

effect is that Galactic Cepheids of a given period are brighter than LMC Cepheids.
17 Here, as elsewhere in astronomy, the term “metals” is used to refer to any element heavier than helium.

Metallicity is usually quoted as 12+log(O/H), where O and H are the abundances of oxygen and hydrogen.
18 The details are discussed in more detail in an earlier version of this review [102].

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The Hubble Constant 27

criteria for rejecting outlying Cepheids; this lowers 𝐻0 to 70.6 ± 3.3 km s−1 Mpc−1 . The alter-
native distance ladder measurement, using parallax measurements of Galactic Cepheids [14] gives
75.7 ± 2.6 km s−1 Mpc−1 , and using the best available sample of LMC Cepheids observed in the
infrared [160] yields 74.4 ± 2.5 km s−1 Mpc−1 . Infrared observations are important because they
reduce the potential error involved in extinction corrections. Indeed, the Carnegie Hubble Pro-
gramme [69] takes this further by using mid-IR observations (at 3.6 𝜇m) of the Benedict et al.
Galactic Cepheids with measured parallaxes, thus anchoring the calibration of the mid-IR P-L
relation in these objects, and obtaining 𝐻0 = 74.3 ± 2.1 km s−1 Mpc−1 . In the mid-IR, as well as
smaller extinction corrections, metallicity effects are also generally less. However, arguments for
lower values based on different outlier rejection can give a combined estimate for the three different
calibrations [54] of 72.5 ± 2.5 km s−1 Mpc−1 .

3.3.3 SNe Ia systematics

The calibration of the type Ia supernova distance scale, and hence 𝐻0 , is affected by the selection
of galaxies used which contain both Cepheids and historical supernovae. Riess et al. [170] make the
case for the exclusion of a number of older supernovae from previous samples with measurements
on photographic plates. Their exclusion, leaving four calibrators with data judged to be of high
quality, has the effect of shrinking the average distances, and hence raising 𝐻0 , by a few percent.
Freedman et al. [71] included six galaxies including SN 1937C, excluded by [170], but obtained
approximately the same value for 𝐻0 .
Since SNe Ia occur in galaxies, their brightnesses are likely to be altered by extinction in the
host galaxy. This effect can be assessed and, if necessary, corrected for, using information about
SNe Ia colours in local SNe. The effect is found to be smaller than other systematics within the
distance ladder [172].
Further possible effects include differences in SNe Ia luminosities as a function of environment.
Wang et al. [234] used a sample of 109 supernovae to determine a possible effect of metallicity
on SNe Ia luminosity, in the sense that supernovae closer to the centre of the galaxy (and hence
of higher metallicity) are brighter. They include colour information using the indicator Δ𝐶12 ≡
(𝐵 − 𝑉 )12 days , the 𝐵 − 𝑉 colour at 12 days after maximum, as a means of reducing scatter in
the relation between peak luminosity and Δ𝑚15 which forms the traditional standard candle.
Their value of 𝐻0 is, however, quite close to the Key Project value, as they use the four galaxies
of [170] to tie the supernova and Cepheid scales together. This closeness indicates that the SNe Ia
environment dependence is probably a small effect compared with the systematics associated with
Cepheid metallicity.

3.3.4 Other methods of establishing the distance scale

In some cases, independent distances to galaxies are available in the form of studies of the tip
of the red giant branch. This phenomenon refers to the fact that metal-poor, population II red
giant stars have a well-defined cutoff in luminosity which, in the 𝐼-band, does not vary much
with nuisance parameters such as stellar population age. Deep imaging can therefore provide an
independent standard candle which can be compared with that of the Cepheids, and in particular
with the metallicity of the Cepheids in different galaxies. The result [181] is again that metal-rich
Cepheids are brighter, with a quoted slope of −0.24 ± 0.05 mag dex−1 . This agrees with earlier
determinations [111, 107] and is usually adopted when a global correction is applied.
Several different methods have been proposed to bypass some of the early rungs of the distance
scale and provide direct measurements of distance to relatively nearby galaxies. Many of these are
reviewed in the article by Olling [144].
One of the most promising methods is the use of detached eclipsing binary stars to determine
distances directly [147]. In nearby binary stars, where the components can be resolved, the de-

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28 Neal Jackson

termination of the angular separation, period and radial velocity amplitude immediately yields a
distance estimate. In more distant eclipsing binaries in other galaxies, the angular separation can-
not be measured directly. However, the light-curve shapes provide information about the orbital
period, the ratio of the radius of each star to the orbital separation, and the ratio of the stars’
luminosities. Radial velocity curves can then be used to derive the stellar radii directly. If we can
obtain a physical handle on the stellar surface brightness (e.g., by study of the spectral lines) then
this, together with knowledge of the stellar radius and of the observed flux received from each star,
gives a determination of distance. The DIRECT project [23] has used this method to derive a
distance of 964 ± 54 kpc to M33, which is higher than standard distances of 800 – 850 kpc [70, 124].
It will be interesting to see whether this discrepancy continues after further investigation.
A somewhat related method, but involving rotations of stars around the centre of a distant
galaxy, is the method of rotational parallax [161, 145, 144]. Here one observes both the proper
motion corresponding to circular rotation, and the radial velocity, of stars within the galaxy.
Accurate measurement of the proper motion is difficult and will require observations from future
space missions.

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The Hubble Constant 29

4 The CMB and Cosmological Estimates of the Distance

Scale
4.1 The physics of the anisotropy spectrum and its implications
The physics of stellar distance calibrators is very complicated, because it comes from the era in
which the Universe has had time to evolve complicated astrophysics. A large class of alternative
approaches to cosmological parameters in general involve going back to an era where astrophysics
is relatively simple and linear, the epoch of recombination at which the CMB fluctuations can
be studied. Although tests involving the CMB do not directly determine 𝐻0 , they provide joint
information about 𝐻0 and other cosmological parameters which is improving at a very rapid rate.
In the Universe’s early history, its temperature was high enough to prohibit the formation of
atoms, and the Universe was therefore ionized. Approximately 4 × 105 yr after the Big Bang,
corresponding to a redshift 𝑧rec ∼ 1000, the temperature dropped enough to allow the formation
of atoms, a point known as “recombination”. For photons, the consequence of recombination was
that photons no longer scattered from ionized particles but were free to stream. After recombina-
tion, these primordial photons reddened with the expansion of the Universe, forming the cosmic
microwave background (CMB) which we observe today as a black-body radiation background at
2.73 K.
In the early Universe, structure existed in the form of small density fluctuations (𝛿𝜌/𝜌 ∼ 0.01)
in the photon-baryon fluid. The resulting pressure gradients, together with gravitational restoring
forces, drove oscillations, very similar to the acoustic oscillations commonly√known as sound waves.
Fluctuations prior to recombination could propagate at the relativistic (𝑐/ 3) sound speed as the
Universe expanded. At recombination, the structure was dominated by those oscillation frequencies
which had completed a half-integral number of oscillations within the characteristic size of the
Universe at recombination;19 this pattern became frozen into the photon field which formed the
CMB once the photons and baryons decoupled and the sound speed dropped. The process is
reviewed in much more detail in [92].
The resulting “acoustic peaks” dominate the fluctuation spectrum (see Figure 8). Their angular
scale is a function of the size of the Universe at the time of recombination, and the angular diame-
ter distance between us and 𝑧rec . Since the angular diameter distance is a function of cosmological
parameters, measurement of the positions of the acoustic peaks provides a constraint on cosmo-
logical parameters. Specifically, the more closed the spatial geometry of the Universe, the smaller
the angular diameter distance for a given redshift, and the larger the characteristic scale of the
acoustic peaks. The measurement of the peak position has become a strong constraint in successive
observations (in particular BOOMERanG [47], MAXIMA [83], and WMAP, reported in [201] and
[202]) and corresponds to an approximately spatially flat Universe in which Ωm + ΩΛ ≃ 1.
But the global geometry of the Universe is not the only property which can be deduced from the
fluctuation spectrum.20 The peaks are also sensitive to the density of baryons, of total (baryonic
+ dark) matter, and of vacuum energy (energy associated with the cosmological constant). These
densities scale with the square of the Hubble parameter times the corresponding dimensionless
densities [see Eq. (5)] and measurement of the acoustic peaks therefore provides information on
the Hubble constant, degenerate with other parameters, principally Ωm and ΩΛ . The second peak
strongly constrains the baryon density, Ωb 𝐻02 , and the third peak is sensitive to the total matter
density in the form Ωm 𝐻02 .
19 This characteristic size is about 4 × 105 light years at recombination, corresponding to an angular scale of

about 1∘ on the sky. The fact that the CMB is homogeneous on scales much larger than this is an illustration of
the “horizon problem” discussed in Section 1.2, and which inflation may solve.
20 See http://background.uchicago.edu/ whu/intermediate/intermediate.html for a much longer exposition
~
and tutorial on all these areas.

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30 Neal Jackson

Figure 8: Diagram of the CMB anisotropies, plotted as strength against spatial frequency, from the 2013
Planck data. The measured points are shown together with best-fit models. Note the acoustic peaks, the
largest of which corresponds to an angular scale of about half a degree. Image reproduced with permission
from [2], copyright by ESO.

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The Hubble Constant 31

4.2 Degeneracies and implications for H 0

Although the CMB observations provide significant information about cosmological parameters,
the available data constrain combinations of 𝐻0 with other parameters, and either assumptions
or other data must be provided in order to derive the Hubble constant. One possible assumption
is that the Universe is exactly flat (i.e., Ω𝑘 = 0) and the primordial fluctuations have a power
law spectrum. In this case measurements of the CMB fluctuation spectrum with the Wilkinson
Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellite [201, 202] and more recently with the Planck satellite [2], allow
𝐻0 to be derived. This is because measuring Ωm ℎ2 produces a locus in the Ωm : ΩΛ plane which is
different from the Ωm + ΩΛ = 1 locus of the flat Universe, and although the tilt of these two lines is
not very different, an accurate CMB measurement can localise the intersection enough to give Ωm
and ℎ separately. The value of 𝐻0 = 73±3 km s−1 Mpc−1 was derived in this way by WMAP [202]
and, using the more accurate spectrum provided by Planck, as 𝐻0 = 67.3 ± 1.2 km s−1 Mpc−1 [2].
In this case, other cosmological parameters can be determined to two and in some cases three
significant figures,21 Figure 9 shows this in another way, in terms of 𝐻0 as a function of Ω𝑚 in a
flat universe [Ω𝑘 = 0 in Eq. (10)].

72 0.992

0.984
70
0.976

68 0.968
H0

0.960 ns
66
0.952

64 0.944

0.936
0.26 0.30 0.34 0.38
Ωm

Figure 9: The allowed range of the parameters 𝐻0 , Ωm , from the 2013 Planck data, is shown as a series
of points. A flat Universe is assumed, together with information from the Planck fluctuation temperature
spectrum, CMB lensing information from Planck, and WMAP polarization observations. The colour coding
reflects different values of 𝑛𝑠 , the spectral index of scalar perturbations as a function of spatial scale at
early times. Image reproduced with permission from [2], copyright by ESO.

If we do not assume the universe to be exactly flat, as is done in Figure 9, then we obtain
a degeneracy with 𝐻0 in the sense that decreasing 𝐻0 increases the total density of the universe
(approximately by 0.1 in units of the critical density for a 20 km s−1 Mpc−1 decrease in 𝐻0 ). CMB
data by themselves, without any further assumptions or extra data, do not supply a significant
constraint on 𝐻0 compared to those which are obtainable by other methods. Other observing
programmes are, however, available which result in constraints on the Hubble constant together
with other parameters, notably Ωm , ΩΛ and 𝑤 (the dark energy equation of state parameter defined
in Section 1.2); we can either regard 𝑤 as a constant or allow a variation with redshift. We sketch
21 See Table 2 of [2] for a full list.

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32 Neal Jackson

these briefly here; a full review of all programmes addressing cosmic acceleration can be found in
the review by Weinberg et al. [235].
The first such supplementary programme is the study of type Ia supernovae, which as we have
seen function as standard candles (or at least easily calibratable candles). They therefore determine
the luminosity distance 𝐷𝐿 . Studies of SNe Ia were the first indication that 𝐷𝐿 varies with 𝑧 in
such a way that an acceleration term, corresponding to a non-zero ΩΛ is required [157, 158, 169],
a discovery that won the 2011 Nobel Prize in physics. This determination of luminosity distance
gives constraints in the Ωm : ΩΛ plane, which are more or less orthogonal to the CMB constraints.
Currently, the most complete samples of distant SNe come from SDSS surveys at low redshift
(𝑧 < 0.4) [73, 182, 89, 109], the ESSENCE survey at moderate redshift (0.1 < 𝑧 < 0.78) [135, 238],
the SNLS surveys at 𝑧 < 1 [40] and high-redshift (𝑧 > 0.6) HST surveys [171, 46, 208]. In the
future, surveys in the infrared should be capable of extending the redshift range further [175].
The second important programme is the measurement of structure at more recent epochs than
the epoch of recombination using the characteristic length scale frozen into the structure of matter
at recombination (Section 4.1). This is manifested in the real Universe by an expected preferred
correlation length of ∼ 100 Mpc between observed baryon structures, otherwise known as galaxies.
These baryon acoustic oscillations (BAOs) measure a standard rod, and constrain the distance
measure 𝐷𝑉 ≡ (𝑐𝑧(1 + 𝑧)2 𝐷𝐴 2
𝐻(𝑧)−1 )1/3 (e.g. [56]). The largest sample available for such studies
comes from luminous red galaxies (LRGs) in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey [240]. The expected
signal was first found [56] in the form of an increased power in the cross-correlation between galaxies
at separations of about 100 Mpc, and corresponds to an effective measurement of angular diameter
distance to a redshift 𝑧 ∼ 0.35. Since then, this characteristic distance has been found in other
samples at different redshifts, 6dFGS at 𝑧 ≃ 0.1 [15], further SDSS work at 𝑧 = 0.37 [148] and by
the BOSS and WiggleZ collaborations at 𝑧 ≃ 0.6 [19, 6]. It has also been observed in studies of
the Ly𝛼 forest [31, 199, 48]. In principle, provided the data are good enough, the BAO can be
studied separately in the radial and transverse directions, giving separate constraints on 𝐷𝐴 and
𝐻(𝑧) [184, 26] and hence more straightforward and accurate cosmology.
There are a number of other programmes that constrain combinations of cosmological parame-
ters, which can break degeneracies involving 𝐻0 . Weak-lensing observations have progressed very
substantially over the last decade, after a large programme of quantifying and reducing system-
atic errors; these observations consist of measuring shapes of large numbers of galaxies in order
to extract the small shearing signal produced by matter along the line of sight. The quantity
directly probed by such observations is a combination of Ωm and 𝜎8 , the rms density fluctuation at
a scale of 8ℎ−1 Mpc. State-of-the-art surveys include the CFHT survey [85, 110] and SDSS-based
surveys [125]. Structure can also be mapped using Lyman-𝛼 forest observations. The spectra of
distant quasars have deep absorption lines corresponding to absorbing matter along the line of
sight. The distribution of these lines measures clustering of matter on small scales and thus carries
cosmological information (e.g. [226, 133]). Clustering on small scales [215] can be mapped, and
the matter power spectrum can be measured, using large samples of galaxies, giving constraints
on combinations of 𝐻0 , Ωm and 𝜎8 .

4.2.1 Combined constraints

As already mentioned, Planck observations of the CMB alone are capable of supplying a good
constraint on 𝐻0 , given three assumptions: the curvature of the Universe, Ω𝑘 , is zero, that dark
energy is a cosmological constant (𝑤 = −1) and that it is independent of redshift (𝑤 ̸= 𝑤(𝑧)). In
general, every other accurate measurement of a combination of cosmological parameters allows one
to relax one of the assumptions. For example, if we admit the BAO data together with the CMB,
we can allow Ω𝑘 to be a free parameter [216, 6, 2]. Using earlier WMAP data for the CMB, 𝐻0 is
derived to be 69.3 ± 1.6 km s−1 Mpc−1 [134, 6], which does not change significantly using Planck

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The Hubble Constant 33

data (68.4 ± 1.0 km s−1 Mpc−1 [2]); the curvature in each case is tightly constrained (to < 0.01)
and consistent with zero. If we introduce supernova data instead of BAO data, we can obtain 𝑤
provided that Ω𝑘 = 0 [235, 2] and this is found to be consistent with 𝑤 = −1 within errors of
about 0.1 – 0.2 [2].
If we wish to proceed further, we need to introduce additional data to get tight constraints on
𝐻0 . The obvious option is to use both BAO and SNe data together with the CMB, which results
in 𝐻0 = 68.7 ± 1.9 km s−1 Mpc−1 [19] and 69.6 ± 1.7 (see Table 4 of [6]) using the WMAP CMB
constraints. Such analyses continue to give low errors on 𝐻0 even allowing for a varying 𝑤 in
a non-flat universe, although they do use the results from three separate probes to achieve this.
Alternatively, extrapolation of the BAO results to 𝑧 = 0 give 𝐻0 directly [55, 15, 235] because
the BAO measures a standard ruler, and the lower the redshift, the purer the standard ruler’s
dependence on the Hubble constant becomes, independent of other elements in the definition of
Hubble parameter such as Ω𝑘 and 𝑤. The lowest-redshift BAO measurement is that of the 6dF,
which suggests 𝐻0 = 67.0 ± 3.2 km s−1 Mpc−1 [15].

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34 Neal Jackson

5 Conclusion
Progress over the last few years in determining the Hubble constant to increasing accuracy has been
encouraging and rapid. For the first time, in the form of megamaser studies, there is a one-step
method available which does not have serious systematics. Simultaneously, gravitational lens time
delays, also a one-step method but with a historical problem with systematics due to the mass
model, has also made progress due to a combination of better simulations of the environment of the
lens galaxies and better use of information which helps to ease the mass degeneracy. The classical
Cepheid method has also yielded greatly improved control of systematics, mainly by moving to
calibrations based on NGC 4258 and Galactic Cepheids which are much less sensitive to metallicity
effects.
Identification of the current “headline” best 𝐻0 distance determinations, by methods involving
astrophysical objects, is a somewhat subjective business. However, most such lists are likely to
include the following, including the likely update paths:

ˆ Megamasers: 68.0 ± 4.8 km s−1 Mpc−1 [24]. Further progress will be made by identification
and monitoring of additional targets, since the systematics are likely to be well controlled
using this method.
−1
ˆ Gravitational lenses: 73.1+2.4
−3.6 km s Mpc−1 [206] (best determination with systematics con-
−1
trolled, two lenses), 69±6/4 km s Mpc−1 [194] (18 lenses, but errors from range of free-form
modelling). Progress is likely by careful control of systematics to do with the lens mass model
and the surroundings in further objects; a programme (H0LiCOW [204]) is beginning with
precisely this objective.

ˆ Cepheid studies: 72.0±3.0 km s−1 Mpc−1 [174] with corrected NGC 4258 distance from [100];
75.7±2.6 km s−1 Mpc−1 (parallax of Galactic Cepheids) and 74.3±2.1 km s−1 Mpc−1 (mid-
IR observations) [69]. The Carnegie Cepheid programme is continuing IR observations which
should significantly reduce systematics of the method.

In parallel with these developments, the Planck satellite has given us much improved constraints
on 𝐻0 in combination with other cosmological parameters. The headline 𝐻0 determinations are
all from Planck in combination with other information, and are:

ˆ For a flat-by-fiat Universe, 𝐻0 = 67.3 ± 1.2 km s−1 Mpc−1 [2] from Planck.

ˆ For a Universe free to curve, 𝐻0 = 68.4 ± 1.0 km s−1 Mpc−1 [2] using Planck together with
BAO data.

ˆ Local BAO measurements: 𝐻0 = 67.0±3.2 km s−1 Mpc−1 [15] using only the well-determined
Ωm ℎ2 from the CMB, but independent of other cosmology [15, 19, 6, 148].

There is thus a mild tension between some (but not all) of the astrophysical measurements
and the cosmological inferences. There are several ways of looking at this. The first is that a
2.5-𝜎 discrepancy is nothing to be afraid of, and indeed is a relief after some of the clumped
distributions of published measurements in the past. The second is that one or more methods are
now systematics-limited; in other words, the subject is limited by accuracy rather than precision,
and that careful attention to underestimated systematics will cause the values to converge in the
next few years. Third, it is possible that new physics is involved beyond the variation of the dark
energy index 𝑤. This new physics could, for example, involve the number of relativistic degrees
of freedom being greater than the standard value of 3.05, corresponding to three active neutrino
contributions [2]; or a scenario in which we are living in a local bubble with a different 𝐻0 [130].

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The Hubble Constant 35

Most instincts would dictate taking these possibilities in this order, unless all of the high-quality
astrophysical 𝐻0 values differed from the cosmological ones.
The argument can be turned around, by observing that independent determinations of 𝐻0
can be fed in as constraints to unlock a series of accurate measurements of other cosmological
parameters such as 𝑤. This point has been made a number of times, in particular by Hu [91],
Linder [126] and Suyu et al. [207]; the dark energy figure of merit, which measures the 𝑃 − 𝜌
dependence of dark energy and its redshift evolution, can be be improved by large factors using
such independent measurements. Such measurements are usually extremely cheap in observing
time (and financially) compared to other dark energy programmes. They will, however, require
1% determinations of 𝐻0 , given the current state of play in cosmology. This is not impossible, and
should be reachable with care quite soon.

Acknowledgements
I thank Adam Bolton and a second anonymous referee for comments on this version of the paper,
and Ian Browne, Nick Rattenbury and Sir Francis Graham-Smith for discussions and comments
on the original version.

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36 Neal Jackson

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