Detection of the Baryon Acoustic Peak in the Large-Scale Correlation Function of SDSS Luminous Red Galaxies

We present the large-scale correlation function measured from aspectroscopic sample of 46,748 luminous red galaxies from the SloanDigital Sky Survey. The survey region covers 0.72 h^-3Gpc³ over 3816 deg² and 0.16-1 Mpcseparation that is an excellent match to the predicted shape andlocation of the imprint of the recombination-epoch acoustic oscillationson the low-redshift clustering of matter. This detection demonstratesthe linear growth of structure by gravitational instability betweenz~1000 and the present and confirms a firm prediction of the standardcosmological theory. The acoustic peak provides a standard ruler bywhich we can measure the ratio of the distances to z=0.35 and z=1089 to