The Advanced Virgo Gravitational wave detector : Study of the optical design and development of the mirrors

• Main Author: Bonnand, Romain
• Language: English
• Published: Université Claude Bernard - Lyon I 2012
• Subjects: [PHYS:COND:CM_GEN] Physics/Condensed Matter/Other; [PHYS:COND:CM_GEN] Physique/Matière Condensée/Autre; Gravitational waves; Interferometry; Advanced Virgo; Thin films; Fabry-Perot cavity; Corrective coating; Metrology
• Online Access: http://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-00980687; http://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/98/06/87/PDF/TH2012_Bonnand_Romain.pdf

Gravitational waves have been predicted by Einstein in his General Relativity theory. Theyare perturbation of the space-time metric and we try to reveal them by laser interferometry. More precisely,gravitational wave detectors are km long Michelson interferometers combined with Fabry-Perot cavities.The network of first generation detectors (Virgo, LIGO, GEO) did not permit a direct detection afterseveral observational runs in coincidence at the nominal sensitivity. A second generation of detectors is inpreparation with in particular the European project Advanced Virgo. This detector should have a sensitivityincreased by an order of magnitude compared to Virgo. The interferometer mirrors play a crucial role inthe Advanced Virgo sensitivity as it is limited by the mirror thermal noise in the mid-frequency regionand by the amount of photons collected in the interferometer cavities at high frequencies. The high powercirculating in the Fabry-Perot cavities induces important thermal lensing effect. This thesis is interestedfirst in the thermal lensing effect in the interferometer for different optical configurations. Then we areinterested in the mirrors composing the Fabry-Perot arm cavity from the calculation of the requirements interms of flatness to the realization of the mirrors flatness and its measurement. The mirror flatness shouldbe sub-nanometric in order to limit the optical losses in the Fabry-Perot cavities to reduce the effect of theshot noise and of the diffused light. We will see the correction of the substrates flatness by the so-calledcorrective coating technique. Finally, we study the uniformity of the dielectric multilayer coating depositionnecessary to obtained high-reflective mirrors. We study in particular the planetary motion of the substratesin the coating machine.