Material loss angles from direct measurements of broadband thermal noise

International audienceWe estimate the loss angles of the materials currently used in the highly reflective test-mass coatings of interferometric detectors of gravitational waves, namely Silica, Tantala, and Ti-doped Tantala, from direct measurement of coating thermal noise in an optical interferometer testbench, the Caltech TNI. We also present a simple predictive theory for the material properties of amorphous glassy oxide mixtures, which gives results in good agreement with our measurements on Ti-doped Tantala. Alternative measurement methods and results are reviewed, and some critical issues are discussed

Measurement of Thermal Noise in Multilayer Coatings with Optimized Layer Thickness

A standard quarter-wavelength multilayer optical coating will produce the highest reflectivity for a given number of coating layers, but in general it will not yield the lowest thermal noise for a prescribed reflectivity. Coatings with the layer thicknesses optimized to minimize thermal noise could be useful in future generation interferometric gravitational wave detectors where coating thermal noise is expected to limit the sensitivity of the instrument. We present the results of direct measurements of the thermal noise of a standard quarter-wavelength coating and a low noise optimized coating. The measurements indicate a reduction in thermal noise in line with modeling predictions.Comment: 8 pages, 14 figure

Material loss angles from direct measurements of broadband thermal noise

We estimate the loss angles of the materials currently used in the highly reflective test-mass coatings of interferometric detectors of gravitational waves, namely Silica, Tantala, and Ti-dop ed Tantala, from direct measurement of coating thermal noise in an optical interferometer testbench, the Caltech TNI. We also present a simple predictive theory for the material properties of amorphous glassy oxide mixtures, which gives results in good agreement with our measurements on Ti-doped Tantala. Alternative measure ment methods and results are reviewed, and some critical issues are discussed