PIP ANALYSIS OF THE COSMIC MICROWAVE BACKGROUND DATA - APPLICATION TOTHE TENERIFE EXPERIMENT

We present two geometrical methods to analyse the cosmic microwave bac kground data along a strip in the sky. These methods are motivated by the fact that the temperature fluctuation field, on large angular scal es, is not ergodic on the cosmic photosphere. This property is examine d in the context of different experimental configurations. The methods involve a numerical study of the expected pip number and distribution function of pip sizes, and take into account the non-ergodicity of th e temperature field. They are applied to the new measurements of the T enerife experiment, assuming a Gaussian random field for the temperatu re fluctuations with power spectra P proportional to k in a flat unive rse. Moreover, these geometrical methods can be readily used to test n on-Gaussian random fields as representations of the cosmic microwave b ackground temperature fluctuations,