Faszination Astronomie Online “Besonderes Licht für die Gravitationswellendetektion”

Since the first direct detection of gravitational waves in 2015, we have opened a completely new observational window into the universe – now we no longer have only electromagnetic telescopes and neutrino detectors to observe astrophysical events, we can virtually listen to the universe with interferometric gravitational-wave detectors. The sensitivity of these interferometers is so high that quantum effects of the laser light used are already limiting. Ultrastable lasers are not sufficient, therefore non-classical light is used in the current detectors (e.g. aLIGO and adVirgo). This talk will explain the principle of operation of interferometric gravitational wave detectors and in particular highlight the technical and quantum mechanical tricks that science has to use to keep improving their sensitivity for higher detection rates.