DI PACE , Sibilla

The existence of gravitational waves (GW) is one of the most interesting predictions of the theory of general relativity of Einstein. The experimental discovery of GW would be an important test of the theory itself. In addition, the detection of GW will open a new window of observation especially in those regions of the Universe inaccessible to...

In this paper, we present a high bandwidth frequency lock of a rigid tunable Fabry Perot cavity based on a set of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) actuators. The cavity spacer was specifically designed such that the frequency of the first resonance of the whole assembly under PZT excitation is above 35 kHz, thus allowing a servo-loop bandwidth of...

As part of the research on thermal noise reduction in gravitational-wave detectors, we experimentally demonstrate the conversion of a fundamental TEM00 laser mode at 1064 nm to higher-order Hermite-Gaussian modes (HG) of arbitrary order via a commercially available liquid crystal spatial light modulator. We particularly studied the...

We describe a setup based on Michelson interferometry for coherent measurements of the backscattered light from a low roughness optical surface under test. Special data processing was developed for the extraction of the useful signal from the various stray contributions to the coherent signal. We achieve coherent detection of light scattered by...