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Successful testing of the LISA Technology Package (LTP) interferometer engineering model

2005; IOP Publishing; Volume: 22; Issue: 10 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1088/0264-9381/22/10/003

1361-6382

Gerhard Heinzel, Claus Braxmaier, Martin E. Caldwell, K. Danzmann, F. Draaisma, A. F. Díaz, J. Hough, O. Jennrich, Ulrich Johann, C. J. Killow, Kevin Middleton, Maurice te Plate, D. I. Robertson, A. Rüdiger, R. Schilling, Frank Steier, Vinzenz Wand, R. L. Ward,

Adaptive optics and wavefront sensing

The LISA Technology Package (LTP), to be launched by ESA in 2008, is a technology demonstration mission in preparation for the LISA space-borne gravitational wave detector. A central part of the LTP is the optical metrology package (heterodyne interferometer with phasemeter) that measures the distance between two test masses with a noise level of 10 pm Hz−1/2 between 3 mHz and 30 mHz and also the test mass alignment with a noise level of <10 nrad Hz−1/2. An engineering model of the interferometer has been built and environmentally tested. Extensive functionality and performance tests were conducted. This paper reports on the successful test results.