The Virgo O3 run and the impact of the environment

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how environmental and anthropogenic noise sources affected Virgo's sensitivity during the O3 run, providing insights to improve future detector robustness and informing next-generation gravitational-wave observatories.

Contribution

It presents a detailed correlation study between environmental factors and Virgo's performance metrics during O3, identifying weaknesses and strategies for enhancement.

Findings

Environmental noise impacts on detector sensitivity quantified.

Weaknesses in detector robustness identified.

Strategies proposed for improving future observation runs.

Abstract

Sources of geophysical noise (such as wind, sea waves and earthquakes) or of anthropogenic noise impact ground-based gravitational-wave interferometric detectors, causing transient sensitivity worsening and gaps in data taking. During the one year-long third Observing Run (O3: from April 01, 2019 to March 27, 2020), the Virgo Collaboration collected a statistically significant dataset, used in this article to study the response of the detector to a variety of environmental conditions. We correlated environmental parameters to global detector performance, such as observation range, duty cycle and control losses. Where possible, we identified weaknesses in the detector that will be used to elaborate strategies in order to improve Virgo robustness against external disturbances for the next data taking period, O4, currently planned to start at the end of 2022. The lessons learned could also provide useful insights for the design of the next generation of ground-based interferometers.