Directional radiative cooling thermal compensation for gravitational wave interferometer mirrors
Abstract
The concept of utilizing directional radiative cooling to correct the problem of thermal lensing in the mirrors of the LIGO/VIRGO gravitational wave detectors has been shown and has prospects for future use. Two different designs utilizing this concept, referred to as the baffled and parabolic mirror solutions, have been proposed with different means of controlling the cooling power. The technique takes advantage of the power naturally radiated by the mirror surfaces at room temperature to prevent their heating by the powerful stored laser beams. The baffled solution has been simulated via COMSOL Multiphysics as a design tool. Finally, the parabolic mirror concept was experimentally validated with the results falling in close agreement with theoretical cooling calculations. The technique of directional radiative thermal correction can be reversed to image heat rings on the mirrors periphery to remotely and dynamically correct their radius of curvature without subjecting the mirror to relevant perturbations.
Additional Information
Copyright © 2009 Elsevier. Received 23 December 2008; revised 4 June 2009; accepted 11 June 2009. Available online 25 June 2009. We like to thank Rana Adhikari, Francesco Fidecaro, and Phil Willems for the useful criticism and suggestions. We would also like to thank the unknown scientist who made the flying saucer sled available free of charge; it made a very good mirror. Yury Minenkov had had the DRC idea long time before us, but never tested or published this idea [23]. We gratefully acknowledge support and funding from the National Science Foundation to the LIGO laboratory under the cooperative agreement PHY-9210038 and PHY-0107417. This paper has been assigned LIGO Document Number LIGO-P080094-00-Z.Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 15797
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.nima.2009.06.044
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20090911-153559797
- PHY-9210038
- NSF
- PHY-0107417
- NSF
- Created
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2009-10-02Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-08Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Other Numbering System Name
- LIGO Document Number
- Other Numbering System Identifier
- LIGO-P080094-00-Z