General Colloquium:
October 21 - 4:00pm Phys 223
(Coffee at 3:30p.m. in room 242)

Professor Rainer Weiss
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Title: "The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory"

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory Rainer Weiss , Massachusetts Institute of Technology Abstract A worldwide network of large baseline interferometric gravitational wave detectors will come into operation in the next five years. LIGO, theUnited States detector, will operate interferometers at sites in Hanford, Washington State and Livingston Parish, Louisiana. The initial detectors will offer a factor of about 1000 improvement in sensitivity and bandwidth over previous instruments and will intersect plausible estimates for astrophysical source strengths.


The talk will present:
The basic concepts of gravitational waves
The technique for detection of the waves
Estimates for source strengths and rates
Detection strategy and confidence
Current state of the project
Future development
LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC)

For more information visit the official LIGO website at: http://www.ligo.caltech.edu

Observatory Sites

LIGO will consist of two detector facilities, one to be located at Hanford Reservation, Washington and the other at Livingston Parish, Louisiana. Each installation will be configured in L-shaped with 4 km (2.5 mile) long arms, enclosing along its entire length an ultra high vacuum stainless steel beam tube, approximately 1.2 m in diameter, and interconnecting chambers. The beam tube will provide a path for the propagation of laser beams between the chambers.

The LIGO installation at the Washington site will consist of five stations connected by beam tube modules (each 2 km in length). The corner station, two end stations, and two mid stations will house and provide access to the vacuum system and interferometer components, vacuum equipment, and instruments. Full-length interferometers will be made up of components installed in the corner stations and end stations; half-length interferometer components will be installed at corner station and mid stations.

The installation at Livingston, LA will be similar to that shown in Fig.1 for Hanford, WA , except that it will have no half-length interferometers, thus no mid stations, and the corner station will be smaller.