Erlangen 2026 – scientific programme

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T: Fachverband Teilchenphysik

T 19: Gravitational Waves I

T 19.1: Talk

Monday, March 16, 2026, 16:15–16:30, KS 00.005

Integrating a Sagnac Interferometer into the Einstein Telescope — •Niklas Nippe and Achim Stahl — III. Physikalisches Institut B, RWTH Aachen

The Einstein Telescope (ET) aims to detect gravitational waves with unprecedented low-frequency sensitivity, where gravity gradients, so-called Newtonian Noise (NN), from seismic density fluctuations become a dominant limitation. While NN mitigation will most likely rely on arrays of seismometers measuring translational seismic motion to predict the resulting gravity perturbations, rotational motion carries complementary information that could improve NN prediction.

This talk explores the implementation of a Sagnac interferometer, a ring-laser system that would naturally provide high-precision rotational data in the low frequency regime, into one corner of the ET infrastructure. The area enclosed by the ring-laser setup would substantially increase compared to current state-of-the-art interferometers, hence an improvement in sensitivity by up to two orders of magnitude could be achieved. Finally, the potential contribution of such an integrated Sagnac interferometer to NN mitigation in the ET infrastructure is investigated.

Keywords: Gravitational Waves; Einstein Telescope; Newtonian Noise; Noise Mitigation; Sagnac Interferometer