1. R. Frey Student Visit 1 Gravitational Waves, LIGO, and UO GW Physics LIGO LIGO@UO

2. R. Frey Student Visit 2 Evidence for Gravitational Waves (indirect)   T=60 ms T ~ 8 hr PSR 1913+16 Binary n-star system Pulsar period observed over 25 years – Taylor and Hulse

3. R. Frey Student Visit 3 GW Science Goals:  Establish GW detection – test General Relativity  Use GW as an astrophysical tool Unexplored territory!  GW revolution like radio astronomy?

4. R. Frey Student Visit 4 GW Sources GW emission requires time varying quadrupole moment of mass distribution Strain estimate: Note: Virgo cluster is at r  15 Mpc

5. R. Frey Student Visit 5 GW Interferometer Principle Require:  L/ L = h  10 -21 or better

6. R. Frey Student Visit 6

7. 7 Inspiral sensitivity Bb

8. R. Frey Student Visit 8 Astrophysical signal types Compact binary inspiral: “chirps”  NS-NS waveforms are well described  BH-BH need better waveforms  search technique: matched templates Supernovae / GRBs: “bursts”  “unmodelled” search  triggered search: coincidence with photon or neutrino detections Pulsars in our galaxy: “periodic”  observe known neutron stars (frequency, doppler shift)  all sky search (computing challenge)  r-modes Cosmological Signals “stochastic background”

9. R. Frey Student Visit 9 Gamma Ray Bursts GRB030329 HETE-2 gamma-ray lightcurve Source: GSFC 2005: SWIFT – 3 GRBs/week with redshift measurements !

10. R. Frey Student Visit 10 Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) Hanford Observatory Livingston Observatory

11. R. Frey Student Visit 11 Vacuum equipment – corner station

12. R. Frey Student Visit 12 Science Running Hanford control room

13. R. Frey Student Visit 13 LIGO @ UO Noise identification and mitigation: Instrumentation and analysis  Environmental noise: seismic, wind, magnetic, cosmic rays, RF, artillery, acoustic  Online noise detection software and analysis  Intersite correlations Gravitational Wave searches  GWs in coincidence with Gamma-ray bursts  Multi-event analysis (I. Leonor)  “Bouncing” GRBs (R. Rahkola thesis project)  GWs produced by core-collapse supernovae (M. Ito thesis project)

14. R. Frey Student Visit 14 LIGO @ UO Graduate Students Masahiro Ito Rauha Rahkola Emelie Harstad PhD Scientists Isabel Leonor Robert Schofield Faculty Brau Frey Strom Prospects: LIGO very near design sensitivity for initial searches Long science run(s) upcoming First GW detection ? New field of GW astrophysics ? Advanced LIGO upgrades, >2009 10  better sensitivity