Impact on Society
The extraordinary challenges that face gravitational-wave detection require scientists to develop cutting-edge technologies that can have significant applications in many different areas: high-stability laser systems; electro-opto-mechanical sensors, ultra-high vacuum; very-low-loss glasses and surface coatings; high-performance vibration isolation systems; quantum-sensing techniques; a system of alerts to communicate between the GW detectors and other observatories; data-analysis methods, machine- and deep-learning methods and distributed computing.
Furthermore, noise hunting turns the detector and its environmental sensors into an extraordinary ear, listening not only to the cosmos, but also to the environment, with applications for environmental monitoring, in, for example, the fields of seismic and atmospheric phenomena, or climate
The extraordinary challenges, that gravitational-wave detection needs to face, require the scientists to develop cutting-edge technologies, that can have significant applications in many different areas: high-stability laser systems; electro-opto-mechanical sensors, ultra-high vacuum; very-low-loss glasses and surface coatings; high-performance vibration isolation systems; adaptive optics systems; quantum-sensing techniques; data-analysis techniques,based on machine- and deep-learning methods, Big Data and distributed computing.
Furthermore, noise hunting turns the detector and its auxiliary sensors into an extraordinary ear, listening not only to the cosmos, but also to our environment. The combination of all these data can have applications, for example, in the fields of seismology (earthquakes studies and prevention) and climate change.