Status of VIRGO

TL;DR

The paper reviews the current status and recent performance of the VIRGO gravitational wave detector, highlighting its technical setup, sensitivity achievements, and ongoing commissioning efforts towards full operational readiness.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of VIRGO's system configuration, recent sensitivity measurements, and technical advancements during commissioning.

Findings

VIRGO is now in the recombined configuration with 3 km arm cavities.

Sensitivity improvements have been achieved during recent commissioning runs.

The system includes advanced seismic isolation and automatic mirror alignment.

Abstract

The French-Italian interferometric gravitational wave detector VIRGO is currently being commissioned. Its principal instrument is a Michelson interferometer with 3 km long optical cavities in the arms and a power-recycling mirror. This paper gives an overview of the present status of the system. We report on the presently attained sensitivity and the system's performance during the recent commissioning runs. After a sequence of intermediate stages, the interferometer is now being used in the so-called recombined configuration. The input laser beam is spatially filtered by a 144 m long input mode-cleaner before being injected to the main interferometer. The main optics are suspended from so-called \sa s, which provide an excellent seismic isolation. The two 3 km long Fabry-Perot arm cavities are kept in resonance with the laser light, and the Michelson interferometer is held on the dark fringe. An automatic mirror alignment system based on the Anderson technique has been implemented for the arm cavities. The light leaving the dark port contains the gravitational wave signal; this light is filtered by an output mode-cleaner before being detected by a photo detector. This setup is the last step on the way to the final configuration, which will include power recycling.