Seminar of Dr. Giancarlo Cella (INFN Pisa), November 23rd, 2023 at 12:00 in Sala Riunioni.
Presentation of the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration, with discussion in particular of the experimental problems, the observational results obtained and the prospects for the future. The physics necessary to obtain the extreme sensitivity of the detectors is varied and highly interdisciplinary, from mechanics to quantum optics, and I will try to give a necessarily incomplete schematic review. From an observational point of view, starting from the first direct detection of gravitational waves on September 14, 2015, I will present the results obtained. In addition to the first detection, LIGO and Virgo have observed and studied many other binary coalescence events. In particular, the first coalescence of two neutron stars on August 17, 2017, associated with a short GRB and a kilonova, which started a new chapter in multimessenger studies. At the moment 90 significant events have been catalogued, and a new observation campaign with improved sensitivity and rates is underway, which in addition to increasing the statistics of coalescence events promises the first revelations of other types of sources.
