The design, construction and exploitation of the R&D Field Lab `Einstein Telescope Pathfinder’
Project description
The next (3rd ) generation of gravitational wave detectors will make gravitational wave astronomy a fact. Indeed, with the current generation about one event a week is observed while with the 3rd generation this will be hundreds of events a day! The Einstein Telescope, currently being designed, will be Europe’s 3rd generation facility. In order to observe the lower frequency range of the gravitational wave spectrum a radical departure from the traditional silicate-based room temperature optics has to be made and instead one has to use Silicon based optics at cryogenic temperatures. To this end ETpathfinder (https://www.etpathfinder.eu/), of which the VUB is a partner, is currently under construction: an R&D lab in Maastricht which will be fully dedicated to the development of cryogenic Si based optics. In close collaboration with the Photonics Innovation Center at the VUB (https://www.b-phot.org/) this project, based at ETpathfinder, aims at contributing to answering the question: “What are the fabrication requirements to meet the ultra-low roughness and extreme surface shape accuracy of Si-based resonator cavities for gravitational wave detectors?”. A second project searches the answer to “Are free-form optical surfaces advantageous for the design, fabrication, assembly and alignment of gravitational wave interferometer injection optics?”
About the research Group
High Energy Physics
Unique on the Belgian scale, about 23 professors at the VUB perform fundamental research towards a profound and comprehensive understanding of both the largest and smallest structures around us. Combining theoretical and experimental research of high-energy phenomena in the universe and on the quantum scale we aim to unravel the laws of nature at the most fundamental level. This effort is concerted in a flourishing HEP@VUB Research Centre which excels internationally. To achieve a coherent global picture of the reality around us, puzzling features that challenge the underlying basic principles in physics on large and small scales have to be studied and understood. The foundations of the Standard Models of both particle physics and cosmology face problems to explain for example the omnipresence of dark matter and dark energy, as well as the apparent need for fine-tuning in several corners of our models and the difficulty to unite all forces. Novel theoretical reasoning and further experimental explorations will provide insights towards solutions. The recent creation and now further consolidation of our phenomenological research activities are essential to profoundly connect theory and experiment, as well as to connect the studies of large-scale and small-scale features.
At the foundation of the HEP@VUB Research Centre is the involvement in a variety of large-scale research infrastructures around the world. At colliders our long-term engagement is focused on the studies of proton collisions with the CMS experiment at the LHC at CERN both for precise measurements and for searches. We develop analysis and reconstruction techniques and take responsibility in the upgrade of the all-silicon CMS Tracker. Recently, we started to explore physics studies at future colliders. For neutrino physics our research revolves around the very-short baseline SoLid experiment at the BR2 nuclear reactor at the SCK-CEN, Belgian’s leading nuclear laboratory. The IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole is our main infrastructure for astroparticle physics with a focus on multi-messenger astrophysics, complemented with the Auger observatory in Argentina for cosmic ray studies and novel radio detector arrays being installed on the South Pole and on Greenland in the search for ultra-high-energy neutrinos. The radio interferometric array of LOFAR, situated mainly in the Netherlands, allows us to observe and study high-energy astrophysics phenomena. Recently we engaged in gravitational wave research with the Virgo/LIGO interferometers, in the USA and Italy, and towards the new Einstein Telescope potentially situated partially in Belgium. Additionally, a broad range of theoretical topics in the area of string theory and holography is offered, often involving links to other fields in physics. Through phenomenological research we develop methods and tools towards an overall interpretation of the experimental results in existing theories and to build novel models to be confronted with experimental observations. The explicit phenomenological research has a focus on beyond Standard Model physics related to supersymmetry, dark matter, cosmology and inflation, but in astroparticle and collider physics.
The concrete research projects mentioned in the abstracts are embedded in the HEP@VUB Research Centre.The HEP@VUB Research Centre - https://hep.research.vub.be