Weekly Report for Week Ending September 21, 2006

Past Weekly Reports

The LIGO Executive Committee Agenda for Monday, September 25, 2006 will be:

(Meeting time: 10:30 am Pacific Time)

1.      Announcements

2.      Programmatic (Marx)

  • Preparation for the NSF Annual Review
  • Budget discussion---Advanced LIGO and other R&D/development

3.      Comments on weekly report

4.      LSC Issures (Saulson)

5.      LIGO Lab Operations

  • Administration (Lindquist)
  • Sites (Raab, Zucker, Shoemaker)
  • Commissioning (Fritschel)
  • Optics and Mechanics (Coyne)
  • Control and Data Systems (Bork)
  • 40m (Weinstein)
  • TNI (Libbrecht)
  • LASTI (Ottaway)
  • Lab computing (Anderson)
  • Science Group (Lazzarini)

6.      Enhancements (Adhakari)

7.      Advanced LIGO (Shoemaker)

8.      Change Control Board/Technical Review Board Session as needed

  • No open change requests

Site and other business issues:

 

Special Items:

Special Announcements:

 

Weekly Report Highlights

LSC Issues (Saulson)

Work continues on the MOU (and Attachment) for joint research between LIGO/LSC and Virgo.  Marialessandra Papa from the LSC and Andrea Vicere from Virgo have led discussions among the data analysis group leaders, proposing some revisions to the MOU and many features to add to the Attachment.  The two of them will join the meeting between Virgo Spokesperson Benoit Mours and the LIGO Directorate on Friday 22 Sept.

A meeting of the LSC Executive Committee was held on Thursday 21 September.  The updates on S3 results for the Einstein@Home web page were approved.  Most of the rest of the meeting was devoted to discussion of LIGO/Virgo issues, including a proposed joint collaboration meeting schedule. Comments from members of the LSC Executive Committee will help to guide the ongoing discussions with Virgo.

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

STATUS OF LSC MOUs (Lloyd)

Listed below are complete August 2006 MOUs and attachments. They were accepted by the review panel as submitted, and will be routed for signature and submitted to the DCC for posting shortly.

MOU

Attachments

CaRT

ACF, DAT, OPT, Z

GEO

ACF, DAT, LAS, OPT, SUS, Z

Hobart

OPS, OPT, OUT, SUS, Z

IUCAA

DAT, Z

Loyola

DAT, OPS, Z

Michigan

DAT, OPS, OUT, Z

Oregon

DAT, OPS, Z

Southern

OPT, OUT, Z

Syracuse

DAT, OPS, OUT, Z

TexasB

DAT, OPS, OUT, Z

WashState

DAT, OPS, Z

Wisconsin

DAT, Z

Embry-Riddle, LaTech and SLU have been received complete with changes and/or additions requested by the panel. These will be processed and routed for signature in the next week or so.

Other MOUs  are on hold pending various changes/additions requested by the panel of reviewers, and will be processed as they are received.

SITE TELECONFERENCE (Lindquist)

  • A site teleconference was scheduled Thursday, September 21, 2006.  There will be one more site teleconference scheduled Thursday next week.  Starting in October this meeting will be appended to the Executive Committee meeting scheduled Monday mornings.  A proposed schedule has been provided.  The following issues were among those discussed this week:
  • FY 2007 Budget –  in process.  Information has been received from the sites that will be incorporated before the meeting next Monday.
  • Livingston Forklift Procurement – has been signed off.
  • Paving of the Parking Lot for the Science Education Center – An IFB is being assembled.
  • There are currently no open action items.

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT (Luna)

>From: Rod Luna <rluna@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • Attended the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR part 45) training at Stanford University.
  • Created a document about Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR).
  • Provided assistance to Christian Cepeda in shipping a package to Dell.
  • Coordinated the disposal of old computer equipment from the Wilson House.  Account Number LIGO.TEC-1.3-NSFLIGO.FY02ON.
  • Screened for three pieces of equipment for LLO (Forklift, Fusion Splicer, and Spectrum Analyzer)
  • Working with Property Services on year end reports for Government-Owned property and leased GSA vehicles.

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

>From: Linda Turner - turner@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • No report.

>From: Cleveland Mak <mak_c@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • In the process of entering into the database that large batch of PSI As-Built drawings recently printed.
  • Made some changes on the current Document Log Table in an effort to clean things up for the document conversion.
  • Scanning - Progress continues on scanning of non-electronic "T" category documents.
  • Activity:

Week Ending

09/21/2006

In

Out

Packages

32

6

Faxes

30

38

 

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Cronin, Brambila, Kaufman)

>From: "Cronin, Holly" <Holly.Cronin@caltech.edu>

>From: "Brambila, Ruth" <Ruth.Brambila@caltech.edu>

  • Placed the order for the speed buffers for delivery to Caltech.
  • Placed the order for the forklift for LLO.
  • Placed the order for the furniture for LLO.
  • Completed change order #17 to U.S. DOE and submitted to the vendor.
  • Working on change order #3 to HPD. The Lobbying Cert is pending.
  • Completed change order #3 to Filehold and submitted to the vendor.
  • Placed the order for the Spectralon sphere.
  • Completed the invoice-attached orders for payment of LIGO Livingston Observatory invoices.
  • Placed the order for Riccardo for the gaussmeter.
  • Placed the order for the mephisto laser.  The vendor will import from Germany. It has a 5 to 6 week lead-time.
  • Placed the order for the prototype boards.
  • Assisted various individuals with preparing orders in TechMart, adding additional requisition approvers, and resolving issues with TechMart.
  • Placed the order with Varian Inc for the spare parts for the LIGO Livingston Observatory.
  • Placed the order for the Spectrum Analyzer for LIGO Hanford Observatory.

>From: Florence Kaufman <fkaufman>

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Jasnow, Salone)

>From: Gina Salone <gsalone@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • The furniture for the LLO SEC has been ordered, and will be delivered prior to the opening ceremony scheduled for November 13.
  • An order is being placed for a new fork lift for LLO.  This forklift will be capable of handling the delicate exhibits in the SEC.
  • An invitation for bid (IFB) is being prepared for the paving of the east parking lot at LLO.  Bids will be due on September 29.

>From: Ed Jasnow <jasnow@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • A special account was created by Caltech to allow for the procurement of items necessary to provide the laser controller for the Max Planck Institute at Hannover, Germany.  Those procurements are now under way.
  • Parts are being received at LLO for the outdoor wall exhibit for the SEC.  Discussions are being held with the installer regarding the schedule.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

Monthly Report for LIGO Operations sent to the NSF.

CHANGE CONTROL/CONTINGENCY MANAGEMENT (Lindquist)

  • There are no open change requests.

HUMAN RESOURCES (Akutagawa)

>From: Cindy Akutagawa <cindy@ligo.caltech.edu>

  • No report (vacation).

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

>From: Bill Tyler tyler@ligo.caltech.edu

No report.

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) and Interferometer Operations (Raab)

Summary of S5 Activities at LIGO Hanford Observatory (compiled by M. Landry)

A comparison of H1 and H2 noise indicated the 6Hz stack mode to be a problem on H1.  This led to the modification of ASC and SUSPOS filters which improved the H1 IFO range out to 15Mpc as claimed by Sensemon (Autocal range estimates suggest we should update the H1 calibration, we may get a bit more range in a new cal).  The darm spectrum with and without the filter bank clearly shows the 6Hz suppression.  WFS filtering mods were contemplated too.

Single IFO duty cycles for the last week were: H1- 86%, and H2 - 87%.

S5 highlights from the LHO elog are bulleted below:

LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) and Interferometer Operations (Zucker)

No report.

Mechanical and Optical Systems (Coyne)

See Advanced LIGO

Nothing significant to report.

Controls and Data Systems (Bork)

See Advanced LIGO

40-Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

DC Detection and Vacuum Squeezing Development

  • The broadband noise on the DC PD was mis-estimated; it's actually lower than we thought, and is acceptable. There is still a lot of spikes in the noise, presumably associated with grounding problems, and the LP filter added to the preamp doesn't help much. But it's good enough for now. The preamp has been returned to the vacuum nipple, refilled with krypton, and the nipple sealed up.
  • Rob installed a laser and some optics on the AS table in preparation for aligning the DC readout optical train through to the SRM.
  • Steve and Dan began the vent on Tuesday at 11, and by late afternoon they started opening doors and removing the access connector between the BS and ITMY chambers.
  • The pumpdown caused the oplev signals to shift, and they are being carefully watched.
  • Rolf and Alex have begun the installation of the DC readout controls. More work will continue next week. They were able to bring the controls computer on line to test with the Framebuilder. The Framebuilder can now accept data from both the reflected memory network and the Myrinet network.
  • Bob is building cables for the DC readout controls, and temportary cables for the in-vac alignment work.
  • Go realigned the SHG beams and increased the green light power by a factor of 2. He then realigned the pump beam into the OPO and lowered the crystal temperature, getting the parametric gain up to 30.
  • Go measured the beam profile of the seed output and LO at the homodyne photodetectors in order to improve the homodyne visibility.
  • Riccardo is stuffing his balanced PD PCB boards and beginning tests. He's also frantically writing his paper and a talk for next week. He looks a little tired!

IFO Commissioning, Electronics, Controls, Computers

  • Steve and Osamu opened up the MC2 chamber to improve the OSEM positioning on the suspension. Steve set up the oplev with MC2 exposed, do use as a reference diagnostic. Osamu spent some time fiddling with the MC2 OSEMs. The UR OSEM had a lower voltage than the others. They swapped the satellite amplifier with a spare, then the UR sensitivity became the same as the other OSEMs. The UR was also noiser than others. They swapped some cables and the noise got better. We need new, well-made 4-pin LEMO cables. Some of the in-vac OSEM pigtail cables were potentially close to the beam, so the OSEMs were rotated and the cables tied down. They adjusted all the OSEMs to give readings in the middle of their range (~0.8 V). Finally, they tried to decouple the back OSEMs from bounce and roll modes, and also decouple the side from POS motion; they didn't see much improvement, but it's good enough for now. ON to the other suspensions!
  • Dan replaced all the opamps on the LSC PD Interface Board in the MC rack with less noisy ones, to get better signals for the MC REFLPD and the MC RFAM PDs.
  • Dan replaced the ETMY Oplev laser diode with a small HeNe laser, and Rana measured the uncalibrated noise spectrum.
  • Alex put in a new martian network switch to handle the new controls computers.

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

No report.

LASTI (Ottaway)

Quadruple Pendulum Noise Prototype

We have identified and measured the first modes of the blades on the upper intermediate mass. We have also observed the effects of the eddy current damper on these modes. There are entries on these measurements on the Lasti ilog on September 18 and 20.  LASTI was vented this week and is now in the process of being resealed. We realigned the main eddy current dampers, reinstalled the resistors for the thermal test, and reinstalled the blade eddy current dampers. The problem with the resistors appears to have been a bad solder joint. While reinstalling the blade ECDs one of the magnets came unglued so we are running without it for the time being.

Internal Seismic Isolation

The broken actuators have been repaired. We should have all of the position sensor electronics by Monday, so we will finish the actuator installation next week.

HAM SAS Preparation

The new cleanroom was installed and the scissor tables have been installed to support and adjust the gullwing height.

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

Shourov Chatterji

  • Travelled to MIT to work with Leo Stein, Lindy Blackburn, and Erik Katsavounidis on the S5 Q Pipeline search and code review.
  • Finallized collocated H1H2 consistency test for the S5 Q Pipeline search
  • Added Q Pipeline executable to QSCan installations.
  • Initiated weekly teleconferences for the S5 Q Pipeline search and code review on Thursdays at 10am pacific time.
  • Implemented automated updating of QScan frame cache and segment information on LHO, LLO, CIT, MIT, PSU, and UWM computing clusters and LHO, LLO, CIT, and MIT general computing systems.
  • Discussed whitening algorithms with John Cannizzo (NASA Goddard), which may lead to improvements in Q Pipeline data conditioning.
  • Gave weekly glitch report update on S5 run call.  http://ldas-jobs.ligo.caltech.edu/~shourov/reports/glitch/WeeklyDC_20060910-20060917/
  • Met with Hannes Helgasson to discuss chirplet based approaches for burst searches and a related work done by him and Phillip Charlton

Stephen Fairhurst

  • Worked on automating the procedure for obtaining the upper limit from inspiral searches.  This is being applied to all S3/S4 searches.   Also, continued writing up a paper describing the details of the method.
  • Gave a presentation to the tapir group on black hole horizons and discussed possible applications in numerical relativity.

Duncan Brown

  • Visited Jon Gair in Cambridge to learn about 'kludge' code for generating EMRI waveforms
  • Attended workshop on spinning binaries in Cardiff. Gave a talk about the implementation of the physical template family.
  • Met with Diego to discuss his progress implementing the PTF code
  • Re-interpolated the domains on several of my numerical relativity simulations
  • Helped Lisa prepare for her candidacy exam

Patrick Sutton

I've been studying GRB060813 using the Xpipeline coherent analysis package.  I presented a preliminary report http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~psutton/protected/xpipeline/GRB060813/report.html on the background statistics at this past week's ExtTrig and Burst telecons.  Currently I'm analysing data with injections.  I've also been doing some code development work: testing clustering codes for post-processing of the likelihood maps produced by Xpipeline, and computing significances of constraint likelihoods (used in comparing likelihoods for different sky positions).  I met with Tinto and Searle to discuss our "Bayesian glitch" project.  Finally, I've been helping Stephen Poprocki as he drafts his final SURF report.

Gregory Mendell

I am giving a seminar at Washington State University on Sept 21, 2006. Title: The Search For Periodic Gravitational Waves Abstract: I will survey the LIGO Scientific Collaboration Periodic Search Group's methods and results. DCC number: LIGO-G060499-00-W.

Rejean Dupuis

This week I've been doing SciMon shifts at LHO.  I generated some nice looking high resolution spectrograms of recent S5 data.  They are available at http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~rejean/S5/spectrograms.

I also prepared and I gave a presentation on Tuesday to some RXTE folks on our targeted periodic searches.

Weinstein

  • Continuing review of S3/S4 inspiral analyses
  • Helped Lisa prepare for her candidacy exam
  • Recruiting Caltech undergrads to work on LIGO data analysis.

Laboratory Computing (Stuart)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

System testing of LDAS was done using version 1.8.305 of the software. Both the lsync and the single regression test (pr2221.tcl) continue to fail. Investigation this week revealed that the failure of the regression test pr2221.tcl is due to improper copying of an output file from the remote system to the local system. The LJcopy in the LDAS Job package is being investigated as the cause of the failed copy.

Testing of PR3023 for timeout resulted in the generation of a problem report for tclglobus requested the returned error message read "Operation timed out" instead of "Operation was canceled".

To facilitate submitting jobs through a regular tcl socket, the test scripts for qalib.tcl (RDSVerify), datacondMDC (.datacondAPI.rc) , complex_data, geotest, compression test, dc2frame test were updated to include a -globus $::USE_GLOBUS_CHANNEL option for LJrun.

LDAS currently is unable to use the tclglobus socket interface for 64-bit Solaris as it causes a tight spin loop even when no jobs are sent though the tclglobus socket. A proposed solution of changing some system configuration is currently being tested.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech

(Dan Kozak)

  • More work on /home disk usage plots...still not fully automated, but getting there.
  • Encouraged Thomas Cokelaer to use LSCdataFind to find his data in the cluster as opposed to staging it back from tape.
  • Worked with Erik on the ldas-cit NFS server problem (fixed by upping the number of NFSDs ultimately).
  • rm'd all /home/dwoods (~400GB).
  • Cleaned up old gridftp-server processes on ldas-cit (discovered as part of getting data moving to MIT again).
  • Attempted to recover deleted file for Shourov, but it hadn't been around long enough to get on tape.
  • Discovered that archiving for /home had gotten stuck and so files that should have been going to tape weren't...:arstop/:arstart got it going again, but I'll have to keep a close eye on it.
  • Did some poking around on Keith Thorne's LSCdataFind problem.
  • Got GEO RDS frames moving to CIT.

(Phil Ehrens)

  • Wrote wrapper scripts using the VDT CertScripts extensions to issue host and service certs.
  • Modified the grid-adduser.sh script to modify /etc/aliases on ldas-cit and to propagate the modified file and run makealiases on ldas-jobs.
  • Installed qonline analysis support for CIT grid resources.  This allows qonline investigators to execute long running jobs and cron tasks as user qonline.
  • Developed frontend and backend cgi scripts for Albert to handle Travel Applications.

(Erik Espinoza)

  • Node Crash: Sun 9/17 node52 kernel panic.
  • Tested Condor 6.8.1 release on Frog.
  • Tested kernel (based on nemo config) on node321-329.
  • Installed cpu on node329.
  • Replaced cpu 2 on node500 (Larry's node).
  • Shipped 42 Dual Rank Samsung Memory & 12 Single Rank Samsung memory to ASA.
  • Conducted bonnie++ tests on 3 kernels (optimize space, default, fedora).

(Stuart Anderson)

  • Working with Condor development team on recent LDAS-CIT crashes.
  • Successfully tested an initial 16 dual-rank replacement memory and requested another identical 54 replacements.
  • Requested a quote from Sun to upgrade the cluster home directory and frame archive storage at Caltech and replace the remaining T3 filesystems at the Observatories, as well as replacing the Sun V880 servers at CIT with newer Opteron based systems.

MIT

(Fred Donovan)

  • Power outage NW17 - straighten up nfs moutns, etc.
  • ldas-pcdev1 ssh issues : automounter not mounting, probably left over from power issue NW17.
  • Spoke with (you) Stuart, about an hour going over the LDAS setup, etc.
  • Checked mainboard serial number for LDAS cluster with ASA computers, some software quotes ( matlab for Michele Z, sata drives for nova ( 2 X 750GB), started spare parts inventory.

Hanford

(Ben Johnson)

  • Worked on improved LDRdataFindServer to be able to serve at better than 0.5 Hz.
  • Helping track down some data glitches at LLO. Some seem due to data mismatches between the front-ends and the framebuilder(s).
  • Attempting to find replacement motherboards for the nodes here. ASA claims they may be able to find our X5DPR-IG2+ models.
  • Helped Christine grid-ify the new Linux GC box in the control room.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT

(Fred)

  • Replaced bad disk for lc; dual monitor nvidia / linux setup for pf
  • Checked Marie's auto updates and firewall
  • Power outage NW17 - straighten up nfs mounts, etc
  • Started backups from lancelot/raid to gravity
  • Set up new node (nova, nee oscar) as second compute node for Erik's group. Added extra disks, integrated into LDAP, restarted slapd on needle, Poked around LDAP setup, did some tracing in order to get nova / ldap stuff working (TLS certificates)
  • Worked with Marie a bit to fix some broken web links, set up Dreamweaver site for her so she could maintain the site.

Livingston

 

Hanford

(Christine)

  • Helped a new staff member get set up with accounts and a computer.
  • Started building a web server for Einsteins' Messengers web site.

CIT

(Mike)

  • Working on upgrading Primavera/Prism server. This software is currently running on server 2000.  After loading Primavera's updated software I noticed degrade in performance, plus a few OS issues.  I have loaded an image of this server to a temporary server while I reload the old server with server 2003. This server may have been having issues before the upgrade. This is an on going project.
  • This week was a lot of work in W/B server room mounting servers in racks, trouble shot tape robot with Larry, and running some additional network cables, plus KVM cables to hook up new servers.  Some clean up work as well.
  • Loaded another LINUX box for Hiro. Erik looked into some yum update issues I was having with this installation. We ended up using the ldas updated kernel instead of loading off the downloaded cd's.  From hear on out I will be using the ldas load for Fedora. Added additional remote mount points for this build as well.
  • Continued work on Spam Filters searching for false positives.
  • Additional misc. user support, plus other daily sysadmin tasks that include working on mail servers, dhcp server, and work on dcc servers.

(Christian)

  • Installed and tested the latest Microsoft security patches on all windows server.
  • Rod Luna- Upgraded Microsoft Office from 2000 to 2003.
  • Patrick Sutton- Configured new Macbook Pro and installed parallels software for Patrick.
  • John Miller- computer keeps crashing after running simulations. Transferred all of john's files and settings to a faster system.
  • Installed new 20 inch LCD monitor for Todd Etzel and Paul Russell.
  • Minor tweaks on the unit in the display case.
  • Worked on the Spam Filters with Mike and Larry.
  • Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Bruce)

  • iLog Maintenance:                    (0.5 days)
  • General iLog maintenance (user adds, keyword adds, systems work, etc.)

(Veronica)

  • LIGO:  Continued working on the NSF website.  This required sorting out the issues of restricted-access information, as well as restructuring the public access contents.  Worked with the AdvLIGO team on archiving the information as public vs private.  Posted the information for the upcoming review meeting.  Working on the online registration tool.  Continued working on the PAC meeting website.  Here, too, an issue of access restrictions came up; even though we restricted access on our side, some authors put their files in docspublic, which then made it into Google search database.  We've asked the PAC20 speakers to archive sensitive files in the restricted-access area of the DCC, or give the DCC clearly stated instructions to do it.   Working with the speakers and the DCC to reorganize the presentations.  Working on the updates of the LAAC website.  Updates of the LIGO website.
  • LSC:  Most of the time was spent working on the website for the upcoming LSC meeting at MIT.  Installed the website, posted the static information.  Working on the online registration database application.  Working with the MIT e-commerce and Marie on the integration of the online credit card payment application into the website that we'll be hosting.  Updates of the database of technical papers under review.  Updates of the author list pointers.
  • Project Science:  Website updates/ user support.

(Larry)

  • Worked a number of procurement items. Mostly supply items.  Procured a couple of systems for different people.  Reconciled Pcard for the month.  Working on a couple of server and storage procurements.  Tracking down items to install new projectors in the conference rooms.  The new units are quieter.
  • Assisted in the setup of the new E2E machines. Worked on a couple of the E2E servers. One unit just need a few more s/w settings changed and the other needed to be rebooted, still watching it to see if it is starting to have h/w problems.
  • Worked with Mike and others on things in the computer rooms.
  • Cleaned out LIGO items in room 054 with Rod and Christian. Also, started getting things ready to move to another storage area in the sub-basement.
  • Started working on the tape robot. After a good cleaning (it had been on the shelf too long) it is now able to communicate with itself. Now I hope to get it to work with the SUN boxes, there are number of issues to still be worked out.
  • Assisted with the DCC with a number of different items. The one taking the most time is the testing of the new s/w.
  • Assisted a number of users with account modifications. Checked out a couple of the SURF students and setup a couple of new accounts.
  • Worked out some minor problems at WH.
  • Started on a new setup for the 40M.
  • Assisted Veronica in working out some logistical issues with the different web projects now going on.
  • The display case is now up and running. Thanks to all that helped out, especially Christian and John Z., there is some tweaking that needs to take place to make things a little more stable but it is looking good.
  • Continual work with the different user requests and checking out the spam filters.

Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

Modeling and Simulation (Hiro Yamamoto)

e2e weekly meeting

The meeting was held on 21st, attendees were Sany, Valerio and Mark, discussing about the modeling of a triple suspension sitting on HAM-SAS.

The effect of the back reaction from the triple suspension to HAM-SAS is studied now. There is some discrepancy between Virginio-Valerio model based on Maple and the e2e model using Mark's triple pendulum sitting on HAM-SAS. It was concluded that, for now, the e2e setup with Mark's triple will be used to study control systems. Later, Virginio suggested that the difference may come from the placement of the suspension cage which could induce torque. 

After this discrepancy is understood, the major milestone of this study is

  • short term goal (1 week): transmissibility from the suspension point motion to back reaction force  without any control
  • medium term goal (a few months) : same quantity with triple pendulum local controls
  • long term study is the study of the HAM-SAS with suspension forming a cavity where the radiation pressure can push the system in different way than forces by control systems.

Sany has a simple version of the local dumping code. After discussing with Osamu, this code will be passed to Valerio and Valierio will complete the triple pendulum local dumpling code. Sany will work with Laurent Ruet of MIT to implement the modal control in the triple pendulum setup in the e2e simulation setup.

Static IFO simulation (Hiro)

A more systematic study of surface noise was done. In short, if you specify the rms of the mirror surface up to 10cm for Adv.LIGO arm, the loss changes less than 1ppm even when the rms outside is worse by factor 3. If you specify the rms in a smaller region, the actual loss could get appreciably larger than the estimation.

A couple cavity modeling is going to study the clipping effect by BS.

Fast simulation of Dual Recycled Michelson Cavity (Hiro, Keiko)

Formulation of an approximation field calculation in a FP using linear approximation is still going.  Keeping up to the linear term in velocity and angular motion of mirrors, an explicit expression has been derived to calculate the field evolution over a long term (many bounces all at once, not single bounce, in a cavity). Next is to validate this formula numerically.  Once this validation is done, this approach will be applied to the dual recycled Michelson cavity, which is the final goal.

Modeler (Hiro, Bruce)

Bruce is developing the C++ code of the UserDefinedPrimitive (FUNC_X based user-configurable universal primitive), built in the simulation engine, modeler.  We have new machines, rigel1 and nunki, dual core dual CPU machine running at 2.6GHz, using FC4.  Hiro and Melody studied the performance. The same issue as saiph is found, i.e., glibc's bug makes the code run slower and we have to use older version of libm.so. Melody is now testing the latest gnu version, 2.4, to see if the issue is solved.

Mechanical Simulation for Advanced LIGO (Sany and SLU team)

Kept working on the modeling of the mechanical system using Mark Barton's triple pendulum and HAM-SAS by Valerio.  See about about the e2e weekly meeting.

ALFI : e2e front end (Bruce, Melody, Hiro)

Melody is developing the interface of the UserDefinedPrimitive (FUNC_X based user-configurable universal primitive), in alfi.  Now JAVA 1.5 or even 1.6 is out, Melody modified alfi so that alfi can be compiled and run using JAVA 1.5.  Hiro sent mails to alfi uses if the transition to JAVA 1.5 is OK, and so far no complaint is returned.  We hope to switch to JAVA 1.5 version of alfi by the end of the year.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason <kmason@ligo.mit.edu>

Single Stage HAM SEI Procurement

The Request for Proposal, Design Requirements document, and reference CD is nearly completed for the design and fabrication of the Advanced LIGO Single Stage HAM Seismic Isolation System.  We are waiting for a conceptual design report to complete the bid package. The bid package is scheduled to be sent to potential bidders next week.

From: "Joseph A. Giaime" jgiaime@ligo.phys.lsu.edu

Agenda for the weekly SEI telecom

Friday, Sept 15, 2:00 pm Eastern, 1:00 pm Central, 11:00 am Pacific time

  • Locks unstuck at BSC prototype; threads had gotten a bit dirty and barrel was slightly scuffed.  We need to find a surface treatment to make both the threads and the barrel slip better when UHV clean.  Perhaps the same surface treatment used in the LIGO-1 seismic knuckles.
  • First transfer functions take from stage 2 horizontal sensor to nearest L-4C.  Also, Rich ran Brian's model and compared with the data.
  • Two damaged actuators have been repaired and await re-potting with approved epoxy.  The correct epoxy is on order.  We are still missing the prototype small actuator.  Kyle, Jay and Bob Taylor ought to search their stuff.
  • Brian has received some pages from Corwin as a start on the conceptual design report.
  • Brian and Ken have assembled a draft for the single stage HAM requirements document.  The draft and Brian's summary of the changes since our last seismic RFQ appear in seismic log entry 691.

From: Dennis Coyne coyne@ligo.caltech.edu

HAM-SAS weekly meeting minutes 20 Sep 2006

Ric, Dennis, Chiara

(Dave O. & Virginio briefly)

agenda:

1) fabrication status

finished loading table this morning-- 158 mHz, stopped trying to get the resonance lower -- should allow another ~50 kg to get to collapse point -- used about 1485 kg (1545 kg at collapse point) -- Ric will put together a note on the loading for the IPs and the GAS filters

no longer a preference for rotation about 1 (preferred) leg -- previously this observed & found to be due to one leg being macroscopically longer than the others

will test fit LVDTs & motorized springs this week, central post for monitoring LVDTs to be ready next week, then will get ready for disassembly & cleaning

received optical bench cart from Soldi -- will re-assemble & then ship to LASTI along with drill templates to create holes required on bottom on HAM table, 2nd transfer cart to be sent to Soldi soon for cleaning

elevator carts: moved 2 tons easily with no problems horizontally (note: wheel/track guard has not yet been installed) -- found a problem with the vertical lift mechanism -- making change to sliding spring loaded clamp & non-reversing mechanism (negligible cost change) -- also changed gearing (still have sub-millimeter positioning capability)

cleanroom has lights now

oven: received final sheet metal -- beginning welding -- expect that it will be delivered on time

Ric returning to G&M 10/9 (will be at thermal noise summit meeting 10/7)

cleanroom supplies: plan for LIGO to purchase in US & ship to G&M

base plate welding: constrained welding -- reduce warping

lateral mode of the spring box: RIc measured 6 Hz, not 1.5 Hz as predicted: see (3.7 MB word file), http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~desalvo/HAMSAS/spring-box-tuning-report/Test-of-the-Spring-box.doc

tilt instability before lateral instability observed (22MB movie): http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~desalvo/HAMSAS/spring-box-tuning-report/tilt-instability.MOV, this should be expected given high center of mass relative to the support points -- not observed in simulation?

2) LASTI test plan

Dave has not received many comments as yet -- please read & comment

3) electronics

Valerio observed overheating of the modified LVDT driver circuit, but higher range, better sensitivity: http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~citsas/HAM-SAS/Presentations/HAMSASWeekly20060920.pdf, noise is a little higher at 2 Hz but likely can be reduced some -- will work with Ben to resolve problems

need to review/comment on Ben's system interconnection diagram distributed last week

4) simulation

no comments during meeting -- Yumei has calculated the shift in 's' mode frequency with change in IP leg load

Suspension

From: Janeen Romie romie_j@ligo.caltech.edu

Attended most of the OMC meeting last thursday before my flight at DFW airport. Working with Calum on design details. Met with Caroline and Helena this morning about preparing for the quad noise prototype delivery to LASTI. Helena will schedule another meeting.  Working on Advanced LIGO suspension budget estimates. Reviewing Justin's UK Milestone schedule in preparation for a detailed discussion on Tuesday. Reviewed and commented on some paperwork for Joe G today.

From: Ken Mailand kmailand@ligo.caltech.edu

I'm using information from Ian, and working on a lower quad installation arm shop drawings. The CES shop has completed more than half the parts for the basic arm.  The fixture lift table for LASTI has returned from chrome plate, and is at CES for re-assembly. I'm working on the lift assembly for the suspension.

Core Optics

From: Bill Kells kells@ligo.caltech.edu

We had an additional TCS review committee meeting this AM, which has required a lot of study for (as well as dicsussion/analysis with Phil W on).

Finished off SURF project paper (now submitted) with H. Bantilan.  Actually the process has launched also an ongoing analysis and further studies which he is still participating in.

I have essentially finished my analysis of how "drifting" acoustic resonance lines affect the PI instability thresholds. This will be reported in tomorrow's OWG meeting.

From: Helena Armandula ahelena@ligo.caltech.edu

CSIRO

Just received the selection of small targets that they ordered for doping during the up-coming runs. They are drilling them so they can suspend them in front of the main targets. They have: Ti, Ta, Nb and Al.  The Ti doped Ta coating run will be done first.  They have also completed the fixtures to hold the Glasgow diving boards and they are ready to proceed with those.

Advanced LIGO SUS

Working with Janeen and Caroline on how to pursue the installation and commissioning of equipment needed for ribbon pulling, welding and characterization at LASTI.

Auxiliary Optics

From: Michael Smith <smith@ligo.caltech.edu>

PO TEL

Chris and Calum have decided that the conceptual design for the ETM PO TEL suspension assembly, including a suspended output detection bench will be similar to the PO Mirror SUS. Chris will make a conceptual SW drawing. The baseline concept for the earthquake stops/catcher for the lower mass is to mount it to the chamber walls.

LAYOUT

I calculated new positions for the PRM, SRM, ITMx, and ITMy; which are compatible with a free spectral range of 9 Mhz for the PR cavity, 180 MHz for the SR cavity, and a Schnoop assymetry of 200mm. The average PRC optical length is 8327.6 mm, and the average SRC optical length is 8340.8 mm with a detuning of 0.1. I used the formalism given on p.3 of T010076-01. The ITMy mirror was placed at the closest position to the BS--this position may change when Chris updates the layout with the PO Mirror SUS design. The global coordinates of the optics are as follows:

optic

X

Y

Z

PRM HR

-3526.7

219.0

157

SRM HR

-180.6

-3087.3

159.3

ITMX HR

4847.4

200

80

ITMY HR

-200

4900

86

OPTLEV

I am writing the conceptual design requirements document for the AOS OPTLEV subsystem

SLC

Luke has a conceptual SW layout of the HAM2 and HAM3 baffles in the vault.

Pre-Stabilized Laser

From: Peter King pking@ligo.caltech.edu

I have been characterising the performance of a differential photodetector to see if it performs any better at low frequencies.  The low-frequency measurements keep getting reset whenever machinery is operated from either the machine shop below or next door to the lab.  This is a tad inconvenient.  I have not analysed the data taken thus far but certainly the dark noise is no worse than is the case for a normal photodetector – as it should be.

Controls, Data systems

From: Rolf Bork rolf@ligo.caltech.edu

Lasti ISI

(Mohana) I was testing the Coil Driver Prototype. The circuit meets the current requirements as per the spec for the Coarse actuator 3.5 Amp, and for the Fine Actuator when I measured the noise requirements between the frequency 10 - 30 Hz it is higher by a factor of 2. I am doing the model to to see how much input noise is contributing by the LM12, and it is 318nV/rtHz at 10 Hz. I also found out the OPA549  is a good High Current op Amp. I will do more research on it.

(Jay) Two more capacitive position sensor chassis have been assembled and tested. They should arrive at MIT next Monday.

Lasti Squeezing Exp.

(Jay)

  • SUS coil driver boards received and are being stuffed and tested. Chassis front panels have been sent out for fab. Sat amps are tested and ready for shipment.
  • AA and AI chassis are assembled and tested. They will be shipped this week.
  • Field and rack cables have been ordered and are scheduled for delivery next week.
  • Installation and test of components at MIT will begin next week and continue through 10/6.
  • Preliminary wiring diagrams and rack drawings are ready for installation.

(Rolf/Alex)

  • Completed software testing and cleanup for installation/test at Lasti next week.

For additional information about this report, contact Stan Whitcomb or Phil Lindquist