A world-wide network of interferometric gravitational wave detectors is currently operational. The detectors in the network are still in their commissioning phase and are expected to achieve their design sensitivity over the next year or so. Each detector is a complex instrument involving many optical, mechanical and electronic subsystems and each subsystem is a source of noise at the output of...

Resonant bar gravitational wave detectors have improved greatly over the last 40 years but are currently completely outperformed by laser interferometer detectors. Spherical detector configuration has several advantages over conventional bar detectors and can be considered as the next generation of resonant gravitational wave antenna. In this report, I will give a brief introduction to gravitat...

The world wide eeorts for detecting gravitational waves, the detectors in vogue and the expected astrophysical sources of gravitational waves will be discussed. Ground based detectors especially, the resonant bar detectors and laser interferometers will be described with a brief mention of the space based detector (the LISA project). Astrophysical sources of gravitational waves such as coalesci...

In this paper we discuss theoretical and experimental investigations of the use of eddy current damping for multi-stage pendulum suspensions such as those intended for use in Advanced LIGO, the proposed upgrade to LIGO (the US laser interferometric gravitational-wave observatory). The design of these suspensions is based on the triple pendulum suspension design developed for GEO 600, the German...

We discussed prospects for directly detecting circular polarization signal of gravitational wave background. We found it is generally difficult to probe the monopole mode of the signal due to broad directivity of gravitational wave detectors. But the dipole (l = 1) and octupole (l = 3) modes of the signal can be measured in a simple manner by combining outputs of two unaligned detectors, and we...

Advanced Virgo is the project to upgrade the interferometric gravitational wave detector Virgo, and it foresees the implementation of power and signal non-degenerate recycling cavities. Such cavities suppress the build-up of high order modes of the resonating sidebands, with some advantage for the commissioning of the detector and the build-up of the gravitational signal. Here we present the ba...

We present a method by which the effect of laser field variations on the signal output of an interferometric gravitational wave detector is rigorously determined. Using the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) optical configuration of a power recycled Michelson interferometer with Fabry-Perot arm cavities as an example, we calculate the excess noise after the input filter ...

It is thought that a stochastic background of gravitational waves was produced during the formation of the universe. A great deal could be learned by measuring this Cosmic Gravitational-wave Background (CGB), but detecting the CGB presents a significant technological challenge. The signal strength is expected to be extremely weak, and there will be competition from unresolved astrophysical fore...

The nonlinear aspect of gravitational wave generation that produces power at harmonics of the orbital frequency, above the fundamental quadrupole frequency, is examined to see what information about the source is contained in these higher harmonics. We use an order (4/2) post-Newtonian expansion of the gravitational wave waveform of a binary system to model the signal seen in a spaceborne gravi...

Parametric instabilities have long been studied as a potentially limiting effect in high-power interferometric gravitational wave detectors. Until now, however, these instabilities have never been observed in a kilometer-scale interferometer. In this Letter, we describe the first observation of parametric instability in a gravitational wave detector, and the means by which it has been removed a...