Bremen 2017 – scientific programme

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GR: Fachverband Gravitation und Relativitätstheorie

GR 9: Experimentelle Tests 2

GR 9.1: Talk

Wednesday, March 15, 2017, 16:30–16:50, SFG 0140

Updates on the Drift Mode Experiment on LISA Pathfinder — •Sarah Paczkowski on behalf of the LPF collaboration — Albert-Einstein-Institut, Max-Planck-Institut für Gravitationsphysik und Universität Hannover, 30167 Hannover, Germany

The LISA Pathfinder (LPF) satellite mission is a technology demonstrator for a gravitational wave observatory in space, called LISA. LPF was launched on December 3rd 2015 and is expected to operate until May 31st 2017.

The aim of LPF is to show that the required level of free-fall needed for gravitational wave observation with LISA, is achievable. The acceleration of a drag-free test mass (TM) is measured with respect to a reference TM which is on the same axis, and therefore has to be constantly actuated. This is slightly different from the LISA case, so the drift mode, or free-flight, experiment allows us to mimic the LISA scenario on LPF by replacing the constant actuation with periodic force impulses and times without actuation. The drift mode experiment is also an important cross-check for our standard measurements with constant actuation. However, this comes at the cost of introducing quasi-parabolic motion of the reference mass and periodic data gaps into the data analysis.

Here, we report on the analysis and the results of the drift mode experiment on LPF.