
Members of Airbus DS GmbH, the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute) Hannover, and the University of Glasgow are working on an experiment, based on their LISA Pathfinder heritage, to test imaging system concepts for LISA.
Gravitational wave signals measured by LISA will be superimposed by noise from various sources. Identifying noise sources and suppressing them is a major goal of scientists and technicians working on LISA technology. A significant potential noise source for the LISA metrology is ‘tilt-to-piston coupling.’ This is the generation of an apparent longitudinal signal resulting from a change in angle between the local and received optical beams, caused by the spacecraft jitter. The primary goal of this activity is to demonstrate that imaging systems are a viable means of supressing tilt-to-piston coupling to 25 µm/rad.
Copyright: Airbus DS GmbH, Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute) Hannover, and University of Glasgow