New laser breakthrough to help understanding of gravitational waves

The University of Western Australia has led the development of a new laser mode sensor with unprecedented precision that will be used to probe the interiors of neutron stars and test fundamental limits of general relativity.

A new method to measure structures of light was developed by a global collaboration of experts.

Several pairs of mirrors are used to increase the amount of laser light stored along the massive arms of the detector.

Each of these pairs has small distortions that scatters light away from the perfect shape of the laser beam, which can cause excess noise in the detector, limiting sensitivity and taking the detector offline.

We wanted to test an idea that would allow us to zoom in on the laser beam and look for theggles in power that can limit the detectors' sensitivity.

In the telecoms industry, scientists are investigating ways to use multiple eigenmodes to move more data down optical fibers.

Telecoms scientists have developed a way to measure eigenmodes using a simple apparatus, but it is not sensitive enough for our purposes.

The proof-of-concept setup developed by the team was over one thousand times more sensitive than the original apparatus developed by telecoms scientists and the researchers will now look to translate this work into gravitational wave detectors.

The development is a step forward in detecting and analyzing the information carried by the waves, allowing us to observe the universe in new ways.

If we are to understand the insides of neutron stars and further our observation of the universe in a way never before possible, we need to solve the mode sensor problem.

The study has been accepted for publication.

More information: Metasurface Enhanced Spatial Mode Decomposition, arXiv:2109.04663v2 [physics.optics] arxiv.org/abs/2109.04663 Journal information: Physical Review A Citation: New laser breakthrough to help understanding of gravitational waves (2022, May 30) retrieved 30 May 2022 from https://phys.org/news/2022-05-laser-breakthrough-gravitational.html This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.