Probing Fundamental Physics by Measuring the Cosmic Microwave Background

Measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) are helping to address fundamental questions, such as the nature of dark energy and dark matter, and have the potential to probe the physics of inflation at energies a trillion times higher than those accessible by the Large Hadron Collider.  Our measurements of the CMB temperature anisotropies with the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) led to several exciting discoveries, including the first detections of the CMB gravitational lensing spectrum and the kinematic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect - two new cosmological probes.  I will discuss these results, the status of polarization measurements with ACTPol, and projections for upcoming observatories.  I will also describe the critical advances in optics and superconducting detectors required to make these measurements, and some of the rich science objectives similar technologies will enable for the next generation Advanced ACTPol and CCAT projects.