LIGO Laboratory News

Squeezed Light Experiment a Glowing Success!

2011-10-28T12:46:00.000-07:00

Research on the use of "squeezed light" in a complete LIGO detector has been underway on the enhanced LIGO 4km interferometer at Hanford (H1) . Recently, the squeezed light team has successfully demonstrated a nearly 1dB improvement over a broad range of frequencies. Equally important for future applications is the fact that the influence of optical backscatter, which dominates at low frequencies, has been well understood.

The team believes it now knows enough to responsibly design a potential future upgrade to Advanced LIGO which would use squeezing to improve the design's sensitivity. This is a true milestone and a wonderful example of forward-looking R&D that also acts to reduce risk for Advanced LIGO.

A further refinement of the H1 squeezed interferometer is underway: the installation of a low-loss output mode cleaner. Its objective is to achieve a greater reduction in noise and to provide further data on backscatter. This work will be pursued as a target of opportunity in the remaining available time, but the squeezing team can already claim success in its original goals.

The Advanced LIGO team has been working carefully around the H1 interferometer as it installs the new system. With the squeezing goals met, we can plan the decommissioning of H1 in preparation for the Advanced LIGO components. Our schedule calls for this to begin November 30, 2011, or shortly thereafter. That will mark the definitive end of the squeezing R&D on the Hanford 4km interferometer.

- Contributed by Dave Reitze

David Reitze Named New LIGO Executive Director

2011-08-26T13:50:00.000-07:00

David Reitze has been named the new LIGO Executive Director, succeeding Jay Marx, who is retiring as Director but will continue to work with LIGO part-time.

Reitze, a professor of physics at the University of Florida, Gainesville, and spokesperson of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration for the past four years, has been involved with LIGO since 1996, most recently leading the input optics design for Advanced LIGO. In addition to his role as LIGO Executive Director, Reitze was named a senior research associate at Caltech.

Read the full Caltech press release here:
http://media.caltech.edu/press_releases/13446

Gabriela Gonzalez Elected as New Spokesperson of the LSC

2011-04-22T14:11:00.000-07:00

Gabriela Gonzalez has been elected as the new spokesperson of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC). Gonzalez, a professor of physics and astronomy at Louisiana State University, was elected to the position for a two-year term. She is a Fellow of the International Society on General Relativity & Gravitation; the American Physical Society (APS); and the Institute of Physics.

Read the official LSU press release:
http://www.lsu.edu/ur/ocur/lsunews/MediaCenter/News/2011/04/item28979.html

Real or Counterfeit - the tale of the Big Dog

2011-03-18T17:14:00.000-07:00

For a few months here at LIGO, there has been a lot of hushed but excited talk that a gravitational-wave detection event may have been observed during the Sixth Science Run underway last September. The discussions were discreet, unofficial, and always qualified as "may have been observed." It is the essence of the scientific method not to announce any conclusion until results have been checked, rechecked, and checked again. Nevertheless, the excitement was conspicuous and the code words "big dog" could be heard in every hallway, around every coffee pot. Why "big dog"? The possible event appeared to originate in the area of the Canis Major constellation.

At the same time, LIGO scientists and engineers were always aware that a fake signal - a "blind injection" - might be deliberately added to the data by top management to test the data analysis methods and the personnel monitoring the science run. So the signal might be spurious. Or it might be authentic. All of LIGO was enjoined to act on the assumption that the event was as real as it appeared to be.

After months of preparation, planning, research and due diligence, it was announced that the answer to the Big Dog event - was it real or fake? - would be disclosed at the March LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) in California. The procedure would be this: Jay Marx, LIGO Executive Director, would stand before the hundreds of LSC collaborators gathered in the vast assembly hall of the Embassy Suites Hotel. Video cameras would simultaneously broadcast his actions to LSC outposts around the world via the internet. Marx would exhibit a sealed envelope, open it, and reveal its contents. If the envelope contained a slip of paper, then the Big Dog event was a fake, only a test. But if the envelope were empty, then the event was real and all pandemonium could be expected to break out.

After about two hours into the first day of the LSC meeting, Jay Marx took his position at center stage in front of the assembly. He displayed the envelope. He opened it. A tense hush fell over the crowd. He revealed the answer.

So was the Big Dog an authentic gravitational-wave detection event? Or was it instead a test? (Hint: when the event is real, expect this blog to proclaim it in 10-inch high letters.)

Read more here:

Discover Magazine Online
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2011/03/15/ligo-to-collaboration-members-there-is-no-santa-claus/

Discovery News Online
http://news.discovery.com/space/ligos-little-black-box-110317.html

LivingLigo.Org
http://stuver.blogspot.com/2011/03/big-dog-in-envelope.html

The full story at the official LIGO website, LIGO.ORG
http://www.ligo.org/news/blind-injection.php

Reaching Still Higher by Going Down Under: the LIGO-Australia Concept

2010-10-11T11:39:00.000-07:00

LIGO scientists have recently unveiled an ambitious plan to enlarge the scope and power of the laboratory's detectors. Currently the three LIGO interferometers are all situated within the contiguous United States - two in Hanford, Washington, and one in Livingston, Louisiana. Separated by nearly 2000 miles, the distance between them helps to pinpoint the sky position of those events the interferometers detect, and to act as a mutual cross-check to rule out inauthentic signals. If the Louisiana detector suddenly sounds the alert that a gravitational-wave signal has been received, while the Hanford detectors remain calm and quiet, odds are it is a false positive at the southern site, perhaps the faint vibrations of a tree felled by loggers in the nearby forests.

But what if one of our three detectors were located much farther from the other two, LIGO scientists speculated? What if it were located on a different continent? Already the LIGO interferometers operate in sync with the three-kilometer Virgo detector, placed in Cascina, Italy, and the 600-meter GEO detector near Hannover, Germany. How much greater would the scientific yields be if another detector were installed even more remotely on the globe, somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere, for instance - somewhere in Australia, to be precise.

In October LIGO's Sixth Science Run, which has been underway for over a year, is scheduled to come to an end. The initial interferometers will be removed and the massive work of installing the Advanced LIGO equipment will commence. The complete rebuild is expected to take about four years. If a scheme to transfer one of the Advanced LIGO detectors to the Southern Hemisphere is to be realized, now is the time for the decision to be made. Now is the time for a bold initiative. Now is the time for LIGO-Australia.

Everyone sees the benefits. For gravitational-wave astronomy to be most effective, a global array of detectors widely separated by continental distances is essential. It would ensure optimum source localization on the sky and enable multi-messenger astronomy using gravitational-wave signals. An expanded array that includes LIGO-Australia would provide much improved sky localization and detection confidence, stronger duty cycle and flexibility, with greater ability to extract the full astrophysical information inherent in the waves. Far distant from the present LIGO, Virgo and GEO Observatories, Australia is ideally located to be this vital new outpost in the advanced detector array.

The idea is daunting; no one knows this more than those most committed to its success. Over the summer discussions have been vigorous between the LIGO Laboratory and the Australian Consortium for Gravitational Astronomy (ACIGA). The agreed-upon plan calls for LIGO to direct the components of a complete advanced interferometer to Australia. Our colleagues down under would be required to provide all the infrastructure necessary to house and operate the machine, including furnishing a suitable site, roads, buildings, facilities, the vacuum apparatus, and all the personnel needed to install and commission the detector.

But technical challenges are not the obstacle. Cost is. To seize this opportunity, Australia would have to fund all requisite construction expenses, as well as commit to providing operations costs for a minimum 10-year term. Current projections indicate about $125M needed to build the infrastructure, and another $45M to run and maintain the facility for a decade. So as an estimated $170M endeavor, this is not an inexpensive proposition. But for the hundreds of LIGO scientists worldwide who see LIGO-Australia as the inevitable next step in building a necessary global array, the expected profits for astrophysics are worth every penny.

Pictured at right above, the Australian International Gravitational Observatory (AIGO) research facility, operated by ACIGA near Gingin in Western Australia, is the proposed site of the LIGO-Australia interferometer.

Will the plan go through? Insiders say that even 50-50 odds are optimistic. But an important go-ahead was gained last month when the National Science Foundation (NSF), LIGO's funding agency, greenlighted the plan and endorsed the scientific rationale driving it. Many obstacles remain. The NSF's approval is contingent on the understanding that relocating one of the next-generation interferometers to Australia will not add to the LIGO budget. Thus, much depends now on the ability of gravitational-wave scientists to convince Australian politicians of the benefits of this new observatory, and of politicians to convince Australian taxpayers of the benefits to science and humankind.

Science Magazine recently published a succinct overview of the LIGO-Australia proposal. Read it here: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sci;329/5995/1003.

LIGO Scientist Nergis Mavalvala Named 2010 MacArthur Fellow

2010-10-04T16:20:00.000-07:00

MIT Physics Professor and LIGO Scientific Collaboration member Nergis Mavalvala has been named one of 23 MacArthur Fellows for 2010 by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. The MacArthur Fellowships, nicknamed the "Genius Awards," provide $500,000 of "no strings attached" support over five years and are awarded "to talented individuals who have shown extraordinary originality and dedication in their creative pursuits and a marked capacity for self-direction. There are three criteria for selection of Fellows: exceptional creativity, promise for important future advances based on a track record of significant accomplishment, and potential for the fellowship to facilitate subsequent creative work." Professor Mavalvala's research on macroscopic quantum systems at MIT has the potential to stretch the sensitivity of gravitational-wave detectors. Members of her MIT team and others in LIGO will transform Hanford's four-kilometer interferometer (H1) detector into a squeezed-light interferometer in 2011, prior to H1's conversion in Advanced LIGO. The H1 squeezed light experiment represents an important marker on the path to treating kilogram-scale masses as quantum objects.

Find out more about Professor Mavalvala's research into gravitational waves here, and read this New Scientist Q&A with her, in which she describes her reaction on learning she had received the fellowship, and her plans for using the award money to further her research.

See also the full list of 2010 MacArthur Fellows to view the remarkable variety of interests and disciplines represented among this year's recipients.

LIGO in LaserFest

2010-09-30T11:30:00.000-07:00

LaserFest is the 2010 worldwide commemoration of the 50-year anniversary of the laser. LIGO invites physics classrooms across the U.S. to subscribe to a 50-minute video program, offered at three different times on November 15th, that will provide an up-close look at LIGO's use of laser technology. LIGO scientists at MIT, Caltech, and the LIGO Hanford and LIGO Livingston Observatories will demonstrate cutting-edge laser systems in a broadcast over the internet using EVO, the worldwide collaboration network. A live Q&A session will conclude each broadcast. Teachers who cannot utilize the live broadcasts can show the fully recorded version in their classrooms using EVO between November 16th and November 19th. How can schools participate? Find all the details at the LIGO in LaserFest website.

Astronomy's New Messengers

2010-06-14T14:34:00.000-07:00

At the 2010 World Science Festival in New York City (June 2 - 6), LIGO's special interactive exhibit, "Astronomy's New Messengers," attracted over 2100 attendees. In addition, an overwhelming crowd of 400 guests attended the panel discussion on gravitational waves moderated by noted science-writer Marcia Bartusiak, which included LIGO panelists Rai Weiss and Kip Thorne, as well as pulsar-timing expert Andrea Lommen and astronomer Laura Danly.

The LIGO exhibit offers a close, hands-on look at the pioneering work now underway by a group of over 800 physicists and astronomers worldwide collaborating in the search for gravitational waves.

A number of science museums throughout the country have expressed strong interest in hosting "Astronomy's New Messengers," and the exhibit will shortly begin touring to various locations nationwide.

Watch this You Tube video of the exhibit at the NYC World Science Festival.

Caltech President Jean-Lou Chameau Visits Livingston Observatory

2010-02-02T16:03:00.000-08:00

Recently, Caltech President Dr. Jean-Lou Chameau toured the LIGO Livingston Observatory, seeing firsthand the current facilities, the staging areas where Advanced LIGO hardware is being prepared, and the LIGO Science Education Center. The entire Livingston staff as well as a number of visitors enjoyed lunch with Dr. Chameau, during which he gave a brief address and then answered questions.

Since LIGO's Sixth Science Run was temporarily paused for a commissioning break, a number of students, scientists and faculty were on hand to participate. Included were Rana Adhikari, Caltech assistant professor; Dave Reitze, University of Florida professor and spokesperson of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration; and Brian Lantz of Stanford University, who is the scientific leader of the Advanced LIGO seismic isolation effort. Graduate students from Louisiana State University, the University of Florida, Caltech and MIT also joined in the lunch-time conversation with Dr. Chameau.

The 2009 LIGO SURF Students Present, "The LIGO USA Rap"

2009-08-25T17:42:00.000-07:00

Every summer the LIGO Laboratory welcomes a diverse group of undergraduates to collaborate in our gravitational-wave research, as part of Caltech's Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program. Funded in part through the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program of the National Science Foundation, SURF lasts about ten weeks and students may perform their investigations at Caltech or at either of the LIGO Observatories in Hanford, Washington or Livingston, Louisiana.

This year Caltech hosted over two dozen undergraduates in the LIGO SURF program, and the areas of research included, "Advanced Interferometry on the Caltech 40-meter Interferometer," "Fiber Noise Suppression and Second-Harmonic Generation," "Advanced Methods for Gravitational-Wave Analysis of Soft Gamma Repeaters," as well as several others. As customary at the end of the program, the students submitted their research and technical papers, and provided a live presentation of their findings in a seminar very similar to that of professional science conferences.

Our 2009 LIGO SURF undergraduates not only submitted their requisite work, but also left us with a bit of extra credit material rarely found on any syllabus. They produced the "LIGO USA" rap, a toe-tapping music video that pays tribute to their summer with LIGO. Watch as the engineers and scientists of tomorrow lip-sync and boogie to pop classics in a gravitational-wave theme. It's a music video that briskly summarizes the LIGO mission... and gets your groove on as well.

"LIGO USA" - posted on You Tube.

LIGO Listens for Gravitational Echoes of the Birth of the Universe

2009-08-19T18:05:00.000-07:00

An investigation by the LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration has significantly advanced our understanding of the early evolution of the universe.

Analysis of data taken over a two-year period, from 2005 to 2007, has set the most stringent limits yet on the amount of gravitational waves that could have come from the Big Bang in the gravitational wave frequency band where LIGO can observe. In doing so, the gravitational-wave scientists have put new constraints on the details of how the universe looked in its earliest moments.

Read more ...

LSC Paper Highlighted by the Institute of Physics

2009-07-30T16:42:00.000-07:00

A paper authored by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) was published last month in the "New Journal of Physics" and has been showcased in an article on the Institute of Physics (IOP) website. The LSC paper is titled, "Observation of a Kilogram-scale Oscillator near its Quantum Ground State," and describes LIGO's introduction of a novel cooling technique capable of approaching the quantum ground state of a kilogram-scale system. The work is ongoing and further refinements are expected. Thus, as the IOP article notes, in time "...it should be possible for quantum physicists to use the [LIGO] apparatus to observe quantum mechanical behaviour, such as quantum entanglement, at mass scales previously thought impractical." This is an excellent example of how fundamental work in one research field can have direct benefits to other areas of science and technology.

Read the complete Institute of Physics article as well as the published LIGO Scientific Collaboration paper here:
http://www.iop.org/News/news_35858.html

Firm Date Set for Start of S6

2009-06-15T15:55:00.000-07:00

July 7th, 2009 has been announced as the official start date of LIGO's sixth science run (S6). This has been the tentative start date for some time and, since our progress toward the scientific and engineering goals of S6 has been on-track, the decision was made to commit to the date.

The sixth science run will use the enhanced LIGO upgrades to provide a marked increase in the power of LIGO's detectors, resulting in more than a two-fold increase in strain sensitivity and greater than a factor of 8 increase in the probed volume of the universe. (See the posting below "Enhanced LIGO and the Sixth Science Run" for more details.)

Current plans are to run S6 for approximately one month and then to shut down for a period to allow for a further round of commissioning and detector improvements. Once these adjustments are made, the interferometers will again be powered up and S6 will resume. The duration of the run is expected to extend through most of 2010, or as such time as it must conclude to make way for Advanced LIGO preparations.

Hanford 2-km Detector Retired

2009-06-02T16:49:00.000-07:00

The most recent edition of "Listening to the Stars," the e-newsletter issued by the LIGO Hanford Observatory, contains this savory tidbit about the two-kilometer detector in Washington. This smaller cousin to Hanford's four-kilometer detector was nobly retired after a decade of continuous service in Initial LIGO. Get the details below...

"A milestone of sorts occurred at the LIGO Hanford Observatory on May 28 as the two-kilometer interferometer (H2) was operated for the final time in its existing configuration. As reported in our last edition, LIGO's sixth science run (S6) will begin in July 2009. LIGO data collection in S6 will occur on the four-kilometer detectors in Hanford and Louisiana (H1 and L1). The heightened sensitivities of these Enhanced LIGO machines will put them far enough ahead of H2 that the shorter detector will be removed from service. H2 will return in Advanced LIGO as a completely upgraded instrument with four-kilometer arms, rejoining H1 and L1 to provide LIGO with three full-length detectors fully outfitted with new mirrors, mirror suspensions, 180-watt lasers, multi-stage active vibration isolation and advanced signal processing. H2's retirement brings the era of Initial LIGO lasers to a full close as the laser systems in H1 and L1 already have been replaced for the Enhanced LIGO configuration. The H2 10-watt laser ran essentially continuously for more than 10 years, producing 1-micron light at a frequency stability of 1 part in 10¹⁰."

Read the entire recent edition of LIGO Hanford's "Listening to the Stars."

Enhanced LIGO and the Sixth Science Run

2009-04-09T02:12:00.000-07:00

From its beginnings, LIGO was envisioned not as a one-shot experiment, but as an ongoing scientific quest with ever expanding reach. To that end, the two LIGO Observatories in Hanford, Washington and Livingston, Louisiana, are now undergoing equipment upgrades and system improvements to prepare for LIGO's sixth science run, scheduled this summer. This program of instrument upgrades - collectively known as Enhanced LIGO - will allow the detectors to operate at unprecedented sensitivities beyond even those of initial LIGO.

Both of LIGO's four-kilometer interferometers will be boosted by new optics, increased laser power, advanced seismic isolation tables, and improved signal sensing. Once complete, this new configuration will achieve a two-fold increase in strain sensitivity and a corresponding factor of 8 increase in the probed volume of the universe.

In addition to enlarging the present scope of gravitational-wave searches, Enhanced LIGO and the sixth science run (S6) will provide an important testing ground for the next generation of improvements, called Advanced LIGO. The technologies in use for the predicted 18-month run of S6 will demonstrate Advanced LIGO systems which, when fully implemented in 2014, will boost the detectors' sensitivities by a factor of 10 and probe a volume of space a thousand times greater than initial LIGO.

Enhanced LIGO and the sixth Science Run, coming this summmer!

LIGO Wave Wall

2009-03-25T13:53:00.000-07:00

This is an installation at the LIGO Livingston Observatory in Livingston Parish, Louisiana.

LSC-Virgo March 2009 Meeting at Caltech

2009-03-24T12:17:00.000-07:00

The LSC and Virgo have had their first meeting of 2009 in March. It was organized by the Caltech LIGO team and took place March 16-19. With nearly 300 people attending from more than three dozen institutions from around the world, it was a big success.

Catching Einstein's Waves

2009-03-23T11:13:00.000-07:00

Read an article about LIGO in the MIT's Technology Review.

Watch Black Holes Colliding

2009-01-26T15:02:00.000-08:00

Click here to watch a movie (143 MB) of a pair of black holes orbiting each other, giving off gravitational waves.
Movie and image courtesy and © SXS Project.

Fifteen LIGO Team Members Honored for their Contributions to LIGO and to Caltech

2008-06-06T12:40:00.000-07:00

LIGO Observations Probe the Dynamics of the Crab Pulsar

2008-06-05T11:28:00.000-07:00

The search for gravitational waves has revealed new information about the core of one of the most famous objects in the sky: the Crab Pulsar in the Crab Nebula. An analysis by the international LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) Scientific Collaboration to be submitted to Astrophysical Journal Letters has shown that no more than 4 percent of the energy loss of the pulsar is caused by the emission of gravitational waves.

The Crab Nebula, located 6,500 light years away in the constellation Taurus, was formed in a spectacular supernova explosion in 1054. According to ancient sources, including Chinese texts that referred to it as a "guest star," the explosion was visible in daylight for more than three weeks, and may briefly have been brighter than the full moon. At the heart of the nebula remains an incredibly rapidly spinning neutron star that sweeps two narrow radio beams across the Earth each time it turns. The lighthouse-like radio pulses have given the star the name "pulsar."

Advanced LIGO Project Funded by National Science Foundation

2008-04-02T12:22:00.000-07:00

Upgrade will enable the new field of gravitational wave astronomy.

The Advanced LIGO Project, an upgrade in sensitivity for LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories), was approved by the National Science Board in its meeting on March 27. The National Science Foundation will fund the $205.12 million, seven-year project, starting with $32.75 million in 2008. This major upgrade will increase the sensitivity of the LIGO instruments by a factor of 10, giving a one thousand-fold increase in the number of astrophysical candidates for gravitational wave signals.

"We anticipate that this new instrument will see gravitational wave sources possibly on a daily basis, with excellent signal strengths, allowing details of the waveforms to be observed and compared with theories of neutron stars, black holes, and other astrophysical objects moving near the speed of light," says Jay Marx of the California Institute of Technology, executive director of the LIGO Laboratory.

Read more ...

LIGO Sheds Light on Cosmic Event

2008-01-05T12:02:00.000-08:00

An analysis by the international LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) Scientific Collaboration has excluded one previously leading explanation for the origin of an intense gamma-ray burst that occurred last winter. Gamma-ray bursts are among the most violent and energetic events in the universe, and scientists have only recently begun to understand their origins.

The LIGO project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation, was designed and is operated by the California Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the purpose of detecting cosmic gravitational waves and for the development of gravitational-wave observations as an astronomical tool. Research is carried out by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, a group of 580 scientists at universities around the United States and in 11 foreign countries. The LIGO Scientific Collaboration interferometer network includes the GEO600 interferometer, located in Hannover, Germany, funded by the Max-Plank-Gesellschaft/Science and Technologies Facilities Council and designed and operated by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics and partners in the United Kingdom.