Towards the first detection of gravitational waves
Principal contact: J. Veitch (jveitch@star.sr.bham.ac.uk )
Organisers: F. Feroz (Cambridge, UK), D. Shaul (Imperial College London, UK), C. Van Den Broeck (Cardiff, UK), M. van Veggel (Glasgow, UK), J. Veitch (Birmingham, UK)
The field of gravitational wave experiments and observations has made significant progress in the past few years. The data from the longest and most sensitive observational campaign (involving LIGO, Virgo and GEO-600) are currently being analysed and all the instruments are being upgraded with the goal of beginning a 2-year observational run in Spring 2009. A vigorous experimental and R&D effort is leading to the upgrade of LIGO to Advanced LIGO and is exploring exciting new techniques to improve even further the sensitivity of laser interferometers. The space-based programme - LISA and LISA-Pathfinder - is also making steady progress with the imminent delivery to ESA of the flight-hardware for LISA-Pathfinder. On the source modelling side, semi-analytical and numerical techniques have now matured to the extent of generating accurate solutions of Einstein's equations for the two body problem, that are at the heart of the community's ability to extract the most exciting information from the behaviour of systems in highly relativistic regimes. The session is intended to bring together experts and young researchers active in the different aspects of the effort to detect gravitational waves, and discuss recent progress and the most promising research avenues for the near and long term future.
Scientific Programme
| Tuesday 21st April | ||
| 14:00 | Gravitational Wave Astronomy | Bruce Allen |
| 14:30 | The Search for Gravitational Waves from Known Pulsars | Matthew Pitkin |
| 14:50 | Searching for gravitational wave bursts associated with gamma-ray bursts | Gareth Jones |
| 15:10 | The Search for Low Mass Compact Binary Coalescences in LIGO's S5 Data | Ian Harry |
| Tuesday 21st April | ||
| 16:00 | Gravitational Waves Associated with Timing Glitches in Pulsars | Ik Siong Heng |
| 16:15 | LISA and LISA Pathfinder | Daniel Hollington |
| 16:30 | Overview of the monolithic suspension work for Advanced LIGO | Giles Hammond |
| 16:45 | Optical Sensors for the Next Generation of Gravitational Wave Observatories | Stuart Aston |
| 17:00 | Displacement Noise Free Interferometry in Gravitational Wave Detectors | Antonio Perreca |
| 17:15 | Gravitational Wave Signal to Displacement Noise Ratio of a Grating Cavity | Jonathan Hallam |
