THE SCIENCE AND DETECTION OF GRAVITATIONAL WAVES科学与引力波的探测.docVIP

THE SCIENCE AND DETECTION OF GRAVITATIONAL WAVES BARRY C. BARISH LIGO 18-34, California Institute of Technology Pasadena, CA 91125, USA E-mail: barish@ One of the most important consequences of the Theory of General Relativity is the concept of gravitational waves. As we enter the new millennium, a new generation of detectors sensitive enough to directly detect such waves will become operational. Detectable events could originate from a variety of catastrophic events in the distant universe, such as the gravitational collapse of stars or the coalescence of compact binary systems. In these two lectures, I discuss both the astrophysical sources of gravitational waves and the detection technique and challenges using suspended mass interferometry. Finally, I summarize the status and plans for the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) and the other large new detectors. 1 Introduction Gravitational waves are a necessary consequence of Special Relativity with its finite speed for information transfer. Einstein in 1916 and 19181,2,3 put forward the formulation of gravitational waves in General Relativity. He showed that time dependent gravitational fields come from the acceleration of masses and propagate away from their sources as a space-time warpage at the speed of light. This propagation is called gravitational waves. The formulation of this concept in general relativity is described by the Minkowski metric, but where the information about space-time curvature is contained in the metric as an added term, h??. In the weak field limit, the equation can be described with linear equations. If the choice of gauge is the transverse traceless gauge the formulation becomes a familiar wave equation (1) The strain h?? takes the form of a plane wave propagating with the speed of light (c). The speed is the same for electromagnetic and gravitational radiation in Einstein’s theory. Since the underlying theory of gravity is spin 2, the waves have