Weekly Report for Week Ending September 27, 2007

LSC	Administration	Hanford Observatory	Livingston Observatory
Optical & Mechanical	Controls and Data Systems	40 Meter Facility	TNI
LASTI	CIT Science Group	Laboratory Computing	Adv. LIGO Development

Past Weekly Reports

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LSC Issues (Reitze)

No significant news from the LSC this week.

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

STATUS OF LSC MOUs (Lloyd)

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

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

• Continuing to make good progress in processing the backlog of documents, which includes a large batch of MOU's and attachments.
• Took care of some final customs paperwork for the Glass Mass delivered to MIT last month.

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Funaro, Brambila, Oracion)

>From: "Funaro, Catherine" <Catherine.Funaro@caltech.edu>

• For ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY Press Here.

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

• Moved funds on the Northrop Grumman subcontract.
• Placed large-dollar year-end orders trying to make it onto this year's books.
• Placed the order for the clean room for LLO.
• Placed the order for the computer system for Computer Administration.
• Completed Change order mod 37 to Dennis D'alessio.
• Placed the large lab supply order to Techni Tool.
• Placed the order for the hardware maintenance for LLO.
• Transferred funds on University of Glasglow.

>From: Karl Oracion <koracion@ligo.caltech.edu>>

• Submitted 3 cost transfers to project accounting
• Requested expenditure type reclassification
• Resumed data reconciliation of  monthly operations report
• Resolved inquiries related to expenditure data
• Continued training with Florence Kaufman
• Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport. (For passwords contact Karl)

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Jasnow, Salone)

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

• The contract for test and assembly of the HAM seismic isolation was sent via FedEx to HPD on Wednesday, September 26.  This is the third and final phase of the HPD effort.
• Modification No. 1 to the contract with HPD for the fabrication of the HAM SEI was sent on Thursday, September 27.  This mod was for assembly of the HAM SEI that was sufficiently well-defined so that it did not have to be included in the contract for the third phase.
• A teleconference to discuss the United Kingdom's participation in Advanced LIGO has been scheduled for Friday, September 28.  Participants will include representatives of Caltech Purchasing, Finance, and Sponsored Research.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

We are generating the budget for FY2008.  A first draft has been distributed, and we have begun reviewing these budgets with the individual task managers.

I am preparing a Work Plan and Budget Request (Form 1030) to submit to the NSF.  The budget request will be for the first half of FY 2008.

This being the end of the month, I will be distributing a request for contributions to the monthly report for the NSF.  We should have much to report this month.

We will also likely have to enter end-of-the-year accomplishments into the GPRA reporting system on FastLane.

CHANGE CONTROL/CONTINGENCY MANAGEMENT (Lindquist)

• CR070008 requests budget djustment to reflect how laser maintenance costs for the two sites have accrued. Appropriate budget modifications will be reflected in the FY 2008 budgets.
• CR070009 has been submitted by the AdvLIGO team to address cost growth in the polishing effort.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

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

• During the pst two weeks, LIGO safety has monitored preparations for an eLIGO FR Magnet assembly in the 40M south annex clean room. During this assembly operation, personnel are exposed to numerous potential safety hazards and risks which must be sufficiently mitigated for the task to proceed.  Decision to proceed was based on the results of the Hazard and Risk analysis review.  Use of reviewed/approved assembly and handling procedures was necessary. After extensive review and discussion, temporary (conditional) approval to proceed with the assembly of a single FR magnet unit, was granted by the LIGO Directorate.  The Directorate requested, to the extent possible and without increasing hazards or risks, that the assembly operation be recorded on video.

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

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

A years-worth of triple-coincidence data was recorded by conlog as of about 17:30 PDT on Monday Sep 24th (n.b. owing to slight accounting differences, the range and duty cycle link for Tues 25th, below, shows 99.8% complete for one year of triple-coincidence).   Duty cycles this week for H1 and H2 were 91 and 87 percent respectively, typically with 15.5 to 16 Mpc and 6.5 Mpc binary ranges.  Given the triple coincidence goal was achieved early in the week, a few calibration items were made prior to Oct, see the elog bullets below.  Attention will shortly turn to post run measurements, see the current schedule for the month of October in the iLIGO wiki here.

Summaries as of Sep 25: Range and duty cycle update. Tuesday maintenance summary.

Highlights from the LHO elog for the past two weeks:

• nasty laser glitches propogate into the interferometers: TCS glitches were observed to induce drops in the H2 inspiral range, while PSL glitches impacted the H1 range
  
• some post-run calibration studies were fast-tracked this week: VCO calibrations on both IFOs were performed, for comparison to official AS_Q free-swinging techniques, and the DC calibrations obtained with the photon calibrator
  
• clean measurements were obtained for the pole-frequencies of the H1 and H2 mode cleaners, not measured since circa 2000.  MC poles were found to be 4609Hz on the 4k, and 3555Hz on the 2k.  The new data agree with the old measurements, and are used to buttress the VCO calibration above
  

Outreach (Dale Ingram):

• LHO staff members Greg Mendell and Dale Ingram visited nearby Hanford High School between 9/24 and 9/26 to interact with ~100 students per day on the use of LIGO's I2U2 E-Lab software.  Students investigated a variety of seismic questions by looking at LHO PEM data over the Web, under the supervision of teacher Cathy Stordeur.

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

S5 run update: Year of triple coincidence complete.  Thanks to all who contributed!

CDS computing (Lisa Bogue):

• Continued work on LDAP.
• Continued working with Dave on planning post S5 activities.
• Put in a PO for 5565 reflective memory cards to support post S5 changes.
• Continued S5 support.

LIGO computing and network security (Roddy)

• Reported under General Computing, see below

General computing and LDAS admin (Giardina)

• Reported under General Computing, see below
• Reported under LDAS System Administration, see below

Data analysis & computing (Yakushin)

Storage/Condor/LDAS admin:

• Reported under LDAS System Administration, see below

Data analysis:

• Reported under Data Analysis activities, see below

Mechanical and Optical Systems (Coyne)

See Advanced LIGO

Controls and Data Systems (Bork)

See Advanced LIGO

40-Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

• Elena presented the results of her simulation of cancelling seismic noise in the PRM configuration in the 1-10 Hz band, through adaptive FIR filtering of data from two 3-axis geophones. The adaption is via the LMA algorithm and the data from the six geophone channels are combined in a MISO configuration. The results are very promising! Elena is writing up her final paper.
• Tobin is working on getting the PSL intensity stabilization servo working again, after Rana's mods.
• Justin Garifoldi is visiting from LHO. He inserted a microscope slide in the PSL beam just before the periscope, to measure the beams going into and coming out of the vacuum system so that we can determine the Faraday Isolator isolation ratio. Right now the in going beam sample is 142 mW and the returning beam is 25 uW (-37.5 dB).
• Rob did some work with the output matrix for the short degrees of freedom (MICH, PRC, SRC) to minimize the loop couplings.
• Tobin set up a delay line shifter for the 166 MHz RF sidebands, and set it to optimize the POX166 signal for XARM.
• The front-end controller for ETMX, c1iscex, has been having sync problems, requiring reboots more and more frequently (like, daily). Rana has reduced the number of channels it logs to data acquisition system in an effort to reduce the cpu load, but that hasn't helped.
• Pinkesh installed a new cpu server into rack 1Y3 for analysis of 40m data (sofia.ligo.caltech.edu), including processing of digital video frames of beam spots from our new gig-e camera.

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Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

Following are reports from the other members of the group in their own words.

Akira

• This week I made some adjustments to the beam path between the NPRO and the mode cleaner. Then I made a measurement of the beam radius between the input and output mirrors of the mode cleaner and it was close to my target radius assuming a 5m radius of curvature for the back mirror.
• I adjusted the length of the legs of the optics table (the one inside the chamber) since the platform upon which it stands was not level. I also redistributed the weights on the table to improve the leveling. I am concerned that uneven weight distribution could activate the bounce mode of the mirrors, something that was a big problem in SAC before the move.
• I aligned the beam to the mode cleaner cavity axis and saw flashes transmitted through the cavity. Then I laid out  the path of the mode cleaner output to the output optical table.
• I made a new mount for the in vacuo Faraday isolator so that it would sit upright and accept vertically polarized light. This permits the Pockel cell to see vertically polarized light, as recommended for low noise performance.
• I put all the optics in their final location so that the axis of the mode cleaner would stop drifting due to changes in the weight distribution of the table. The Faraday isolator in particular seemed to affect the mode cleaner alignment although that is probably due to its magnetic field rather than its weight.
• I guided the reflected beam of the mode cleaner to its photodetector and saw the dips in the reflected power as it passed through resonance. Then I improved the alignment of the input beam and with little effort saw dips of 90%, the best I've ever seen for the mode cleaner. This could be due to improved mode matching as well as cleaner mirrors (we drag wiped before installing them). Then I activated the mode cleaner servo and tried to lock the mode cleaner by manually throwing the boost switches but had no luck.
• I put the Schmidt trigger that is used to automatically throw the boost switch and lock the mode cleaner inside a box with proper jacks to plug in the cables so that we can more easily set it up. Tomorrow I will try to use it to keep the mode cleaner locked so that I can finalize the beam path from mode cleaner to arm cavities. Then I will make a measurement of the beam waist at SAC to confirm the mode matching. Once that is done I can install SAC. NAC has already been installed.

Tara

• Orientation program for Physics student
• Placement exams
• Safety orientation

Greg

• I helped Akira install NAC input mirror Friday along with collecting vacuum stuff and putting it near the chamber, ... then yesterday and today installed the NAC output mirror and looked up information on vacuum components to familiarize myself with them.
• Eric adds: Greg has also been working on getting his passport in order, in preparation for next month's LIGO/VIRGO meeting in Hannover and the short meeting at LMA.

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LASTI (Mittleman)

BSC ISI

• We have finish installing all of the actuators as soon as the SUS crew are finished with their work we will release and rebalance both stages. Mean while we are installing instrument cabling and connecting up the seismometers.

Quadruple Pendulum

• Ian and Joe are here from RAL, along with Betsy(LHO), Gary(LLO) and Janeen(LLO) to finish up the quad installation. They plan to finish hanging, install OSEM and align this week and next.

Lasti Electronics

• Jay, Todd and Alex have been here installing electronics upgrades for running the noise prototype pendulum. They have managed to scrounge up enough temporary parts to enable us to run until the electronics arrive from RAL.

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

____________

• Joe Betzwieser, newly-minted MIT PhD whose thesis summarized his search for GWs from spinning neutron stars using LIGO data, is joining the LIGO Caltech data analysis / astrophysics science group. His office is 611 Millikan. Please make him feel welcome!

Kent Blackburn for the Grid Research Group:

GRID APPLICATIONS DEVELOPMENT

• Wrote agenda for weekly LIGO-Pegasus telecon.
• Attended weekly LIGO-Pegasus, DASWG and OSG-USERS telecon.
• Had problems running on FIUP_PG: corresponding with Micha Niskin.
• Problems  running on NERSC have been resolved.
• Finish  mass range testing on some OSG sites: GPFARM, FERNMIGRID, PSU, LIGO_CIT_ITB, UWMilwaukee.
• Testing new Pegasus feature, specifically the new format of tc.data.
• Began running Einstein at Home on the OSG:
  • prepare presentation:  Running simple jobs on the OSG
  • study documentation on Einstein at Home
  • study BOINC documentation
  • familiarization with D-GRID
  • read material on Glide Ins
  • will attend telecom with Warren Anderson, Thoms Radke and Robert Engel tomorrow

• Attended PEGASUS, DASWG and OSG ITB telecons.
• Made suggestion to SRM version 2 tools to OSG storage list from an end user perspective.
• Installed VTB 1.8.1 release on osg-itb
• "globus-job-run" failure on a lot of sites, report problems to ITB list, eventually found vdt 1.8.1 release update certificate have permission problems on directory.
• Installed expired host certificate on osg-vtb.ligo.caltech.edu
• Help with debugging pegasus-plan connection to nemo-dataserver server error, eventually found temporary network connection problems during that one and a half hours.
• Ran LIGO work flow on osg-vtb against VDT 1.8.1 release successfully (now we need to manually add information about LIGO-CIT-VTB into site.xml since the vors-itb delete the LIGO-CIT-VTB site in its list).
• Installed the VTB:client on osg-vtb (need to disable/turn off the CE services before the Client installation and test) tested VTB:client, found vormes file for LIGO VO line is not fixed, "vorms-proxy-init" still have problems dealing with the extra "32" parsing.
• Added test samples to twiki Storage validation page.
• Tested osg-rsv services probe, found problems and send logs to developers.
• Submitted LIGO workflow at BNL ITB site, test pass; put a pass check at the twiki page.
• Exported the new PEGASUS nightly build release to the user environment on "osg-itb-se" submit machine.
• Coordinated with Abhishek to communicate to BNL and UCSD ITB sites coordinated with Abhishek to communicate to BNL and UCSD ITB sites on nanoHUB user fail cases.
• Used new PEGASUS night build and successfully run the LIGO work flow on "osg-itb".

OPEN SCIENCE GRID MANAGEMENT

• Investigated some details of how Einstein at Home works to better understand what would be needed to port this application onto the OSG. Passed this information along to Britta for her meeting with the developers in Germany that have ported E@H to the German Grid.
• Review and signed off on three OSG statements of work as the OSG Resources Manager. Passed this along to the OSG Project Associate. These are now under review by the OSG Facilities Coordinator and OSG Executive Director.
• Reviewed and signed off on OSG Caltech Statement of Work as the PI and passed this to the OSG Project Associate. It has been signed by OSG Resources co-Manager and passed along to the Faclities Coordinator and Executive Director for review.
• Held a brief teleconference with Russ Hobby of Internet2 to discuss plans for CI Workshop in Seattle. reviewed presentations and reports from March CI Workshop held at UC Davis. Scheduled a telecon with the OSG Engagement Coordinator at RENCI to discuss plans and strategy for presentation to be given by me in Seattle next week after sharing some ideas in email.
• Attended weekly OSG Executive Team Meeting. Scheduled two new meetings each week with OSG Project Manager and Resources co-Managers to review Statements of Work as they come in. Had first of these meetings this week.
• Wrote new job description to fill OSG position. Passed this to the Integration and Validation Testbed Coordinator at University of Chicago for review and will present to the OSG Executive Team before putting into Caltech format for posting.
• Worked with Erik Katsavounidis to arrange a visit by a professor from Tsinghua University, Department of Computer Science and Technology to discuss and review grid computing plans related to the Burst Analysis and OSG.

____________

Drew Keppel:

• Following up nearby missed injections for the two new injection run that have completed for the S5 1yr low mass CBC search.
• Looking into a different way to tune the e-thinca parameter for the S5 1yr low mass CBC search

____________

Kipp Cannon:

• Continued tuning excess power based galactic core burst search pipeline.
• Telecons:  daswg, bursts.

____________

Anand Sengupta:

• Been mainly busy editing the ethinca paper which is very close to
• Started going through Sajeeth Philips C++ Neural Net code to understand the algorithm he uses. The goal is to make it more user friendly and maybe re-write parts of it in a way so that we can easily interface it with the inspiral meta data.

____________

Gregory Mendell:

• I am completing conference proceedings papers for last July's Amaldi meeting.

Laboratory Computing (Anderson)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

• Integration of system tests into the LDAS distribution continues. The documentation for the dbmatrix, database exception and putStandAlone has been update. The evaluation of the database performance has been added. The datacond MDC tests are currently being converted.
• The VDT has given us a pre-release of a minimal subset of Globus Toolkit which provides all the libraries needed for certificate based authentication between ldas client and ldas server software. It is currently being evaluated.
• System testing of LDAS was done using version 1.9.63 of the software. All tests ran successfully. The ldas-test system was upgraded to 1.9.56 and ran a full week with only 8 errors. All of the errors were "no such symbol" errors.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech

(Phil Ehrens)

• The usual certificate related tasks and user support.
• Ongoing support of MOU review process and data.
• Worked on LDAS Problem Report #3202 - removal of node references from LDAS account application cgi - Contacted Masha Barnes and received pointers for proceeding.
• Worked on LDAS Problem Report #3017 - datacond API jobs fail due to "late arriving" objects - Determined that handling this entirely from within the tcl layer would require repeated creation and destruction of CallChain object and retention of all input objects for repeated re-ingestion.
• Various RMA's with ASA Computers - 12 fans returned.
• Replaced 1 fan in a cluster node.
• Discussed LAMS and VOMS with Murali Ramsunder via email.

(Erik Espinoza)

• LACP Troubleshooting/Documentation.
• Kickstart Check.
• PostgreSQL consolidation project.

MIT

(Fred Donovan)

• Cleaned-up disk/smart monitoring web; some more disks replaced.

Livingston

(Igor Yakushin)

• Debugging the new LSCsegFind server/client version to be able to return all segment types and all versions for the given time interval.
• Configured ZFS on x4500. Rsyncing user directories.
• u1d7@T3-6 failed.
• Measured that SL8500 tape robot can be installed in the LDAS room once T3 racks are gone and some rack rearrangement is done.
• The segment replication from/to CIT failed and was down for a few days until I restarted it.

(Dwayne Giardina)

• Tape eject for shipment to CIT.
• Tape storage eject.

Hanford

(Greg Mendell)

• I routinely monitor the generation, archiving, and transfer of raw, RDS, and trend data at LHO, LLO, and CIT. These are all up-to-date, as we approach the end of S5. LDAS will continue archiving, reducing, and transferring all of the data until the end of the post-S5 measurement period.

(Ben Johnson)

• Writing up 3x vs. 5x RAIDZ2 benchmark web page. In short, there is very little difference between the 3x and 5x in the tests.
• Working on dataflow "Disk2Disk" document. Basic copy algorithm is described, and generic data flow diagram is complete.
• No improvement on the NDS Server documentation front.
• Discovered that staging data while exporting/importing tapes is still a bad idea. The stager gets unhappy if the arm stops responding.
• I currently have 4 parallel cluster stage scripts for putting h(t) and L3 data on the nodes. There is now a script that can copy from the /archive/cluster/strain-Lx directories.
• H1 Level 2 h(t) data has largely finished transfer from CIT. H2 transfers started. There is a final part of a day to transfer for H1 to close the gap between /archive/frames/S5/strain-L2/LHO and /archive/cluster/strain-L2/LHO.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT

(Fred)

• Burst group backups changed from mirror (disaster recovery) to incremental using rysnc w\ backup option. rdiff-backup seems too slow, rsync -b much faster.
• Some wireless issues high bay (d-link / wep windows in-compatability )
• mm updates (put mm outlook servers (tomcat) behind apache(connector) on backup server).
• 2 new installs (1re: power supply failure, one new dell).
• Some ilog.
• Some more equipment clean-up.

Livingston

(Dwayne)

• More WebDAV tweaks, debugging, etc.
• Problems installing XP on a Dell for new hire mechanical engineer, have v.
• Swapped charter media converter with Shannon and Charter rep.
• Budget planning with Shannon.
• Other usual/unusual user support requests.
• Cleared spam trap.

(Shannon)

• Vacation last week.
• Budget planning this week
• After re-installation of CIT IDS last week, setting up cron scripts, port scan scripts, etc. again.  Spent most of Tuesday setting up CIT portions.
• Charter back-up network went down; Charter called at 3:00 am on Monday to notify me.  At least they call, Bell South doesn't even notice when their circuit goes down.  Turned out to be the power supply on the media converter here.  Charter delivered a replacement converter and power supply Wednesday afternoon under warranty, N/C since it is Charter equipment.
• Finally ordered new wireless controller and access points.
• Still working with the IDS configuration software to manage both LLO and CIT.  With the re-installation last week at CIT, should be able to make both have a consistent configuration.  Also standardizing the port scanning script, install location, etc.  Recompiled snort to be the same version & location on both machines.
• Installed netflow software at CIT, same as LLO now.

Hanford

(Christine)

• All of the files required for the primary DNS have been created and are ready for testing.  I plan to use a Sun X2100 for the DNS, running Solaris 10.  The OS is installed, but is having problems getting the network going.  It was suggested I try a CTL+ALT+DEL to reboot, for some reason this messed up the keyboard mapping and now this computer does not recognize many of the keys on the keyboard.  Reboots and re-install of the OS have not fixed the problem.  I'm going to abandon this computer and start again on another X2100.
• Advance LIGO people had problems with Primavera.  The most recent database was somehow lost.  Mike P. was able to get them back to a usable database.  Ran a ghost image of the current configuration.
• The last SURF student left this week.  Cleaned up her accounts and cleaned off the loaner laptop she had been using.
• Veritas support wants me to re-install the software.  They believe that some device database file was corrupted during the original install.
• Helped two users with SSH setup for email.
• Long discussions with several users about what the best method to control email spam should be.

Caltech

(Mike)

• Worked on a flow chart for Ed Jasnow.
• -Took care of setting up a new user connecting her to the scanner up on Millikan. This was a project trying to get this user setup. I now have the procedures documented when adding additional users to this scanner.
• This week I worked on some Primavera issues. It looks like our backup scheme is not working with our two Primavera/Prismpm servers. This has something to do with the two different server configurations. I came up with another way of getting the database updated from Hanford to CIT and by using the built in Export/Import utility to do the updating of the database here at CIT. This is still and on going project.
• Ordered some additional equipment for users, and other misc. items for our GC storage locker.
• More work on trouble-shooting our Wireless Access Points.
• Other misc. sysadmin tasks.

(Veronica)

• LSC:  Updates of the database of technical papers, other web updates.
• LIGO:  A high-resolution image for David Shoemaker.  Researched various wikis for LAAC.  More work on the test server.  Updates of the roster database.  Various web updates and user support.

(Christian)

• Aidan Brooks - Configured new system with Windows 64 bit OS for Aidan.
• Configured workstation with a Data acquisition card for Riccardo's Surf Students.
• Cindy Akutagawa - Replaced dead hard drive on Cindy¹s workstation.
• Working on configuring two new systems with 64 bit OS.
• Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Larry)

• Continual work on procurement items.
• We've started receiving SUN equipment.
• Need to reorder a number of Dell items. Renewed a couple of s/w maintenance contracts. Updated one of the Calcium licenses for MIT and will update the CIT licenses in the near future. Still a few items to work out.
• Generated new licenses for a couple of people. Wrapped up a couple of s/w installations.
• Finalized some items for the network in Synchrotron. We should be good to go there.
• Reprogrammed one of the edge switches and working on getting the RMA completed on another. There are a number of diagnostic tests that have to be run again on the unit.
• Working with Shannon on a number of items that he has been setting up for CIT monitoring system.
• Still moving files from the disk backup system to tape. Needed to restart a couple of them this morning because a tripped breaker on one of the UPS units.
• The regular support of fixing print jobs, restoring files and setting up of new accounts.

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Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

Advanced LIGO Management

No report provided

Advanced LIGO Systems

Modeling and Simulation

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

Static IFO simulation (Hiro, Melody)

• The performance of the coupled cavity system with different levels of mode matching is under investigation for marginally stable and stable configurations.
• The simulation of the stable cavity took too much CPU time. To remedy this problem, the code was improved and intel math library was tested for speed (see Melody's work). Now it runs at usable speed.
• The degradation of the performance of the marginally stable cavity was smaller (better) than Yi Pan calculated, and I contacted and ask Yi Pan to send me his Mathematica code.
• Melody compared the performance of the Intel Math Kernel Library's Fourier Transform functions and FFTW with various initialization options. FFTW with MEASURE is 10 times after than FFTW with ESTIMATE, while INTEL Library is several times faster than FFTW with MEASURE option. The results depends on the size of the FFT and number of grids, but INTEL LIBRARY can improve speed easily without code modification thanks to their wrapper.

Mechanical Simulation for advanced LIGO (Sany and SLU team)

(Chris Hill)

• I started this project with no C++ experience. My challenge was to modify my e2e software to adapt with the C++ code used by Jeff, an undergraduate student from Caltech. After three months of working on the code, Dr. Hiro Yamamoto assisted by creating a modified version of e2e 4.0.1 which works perfectly with the recreation of this simulation. After the updated code was installed, I was able to run a basic simulation with just a cosine input to h+ port of the IFO primitive.  The graph I received after plotting my phase changes in the x and y arm were almost an exact replica of the graphs Jeff had received. Now, my project is running a source simulation with the binary source primitive with different psi angles.

(Richard)

• This past week I tried to use the lab computer to use Alfi but it was not installed.  Chris Hill tried to install it and other updates needed to run Alfi, however it is still not working.  I ended up using Chris' computer to load my ss matrix into the box file.  I have not been able to get mathematica back yet so I may not have the other matrix ready for monday like I said.

(Sany)

• With the Mark Barton’s corrected Triple Pendulum state space model, recomputed AdvMC’s length fluctuation. With a typical ground motion injected to the base of the HAM isolation model, the resultant amplitude spectrum (m/rt Hz) is better than the requirement (T060075) by four orders of magnitude. The current model takes into account only translational motion (in the x arm direction) as seismic disturbance.

CDS Prestabilized Laser

From: Peter King <pking@ligo.caltech.edu>

• In trying to get the laser control program up and running it was discovered that we did not have the full suite of Beckhoff Automation software and hardware to fully mimic the laser diode box and control box. A list of missing bits was provided and a quotation for the various items was requested.
• Benno and I are revising the testing plan for the laser originally destined for LASTI.  The tests, to be carried out at the AEI, will involve a full integration test along with controls.  I would hope that I make progress on the TwinCAT/EPICS interface soon and by that time.  Lots of details need to be worked out.
• The internal signals interface document needs revision.  The signal count needs to be updated.  This will also give us more up-to-date information about the PCI-X hardware required.
• Measurements of the resistor noise for a few types of resistors we use within the Project have been carried out.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason kmason@ligo.mit.edu

BSC Seismic Isolation Assembly and Test

• All actuators have been installed and aligned. We have started installing in-vacuum cabling.
• We are currently locked to allow the Suspensions group to suspend the masses and install electronics.

HAM Single Stage Assembly and Test

• Ken and Myron have visited Limerick Machine to pre-assemble the test stand and check the status of enhanced LIGO fabricated parts. The test stand will be shipped directly to HPD and is expected to arrive on 10/4. Four support tubes will be shipped directly to AstroPak for precision cleaning on 10/8.
• One set of large plates and EDM cut springs are expected to be delivered to HPD on Tuesday 10/2.
• The assembly stand is scheduled to ship on friday and to be delivered to HPD on 10/1.
• A purchase order for the assembly phase of the HAM system has been sent to HPD on 9/26. We will start assembly of the assembly stand and test stand during the week of 10/1, and begin the structure assembly on 10/8.

Suspensions

From: Norna Robertson <nroberts@ligo.caltech.edu>

• Completed first draft of SUS budgets for FY08 with Janeen.
• Updated SUS schedule with Janeen.
• Held monthly SWG meeting.
• Worked on beamsplitter design: looked at level of eddy current damping and effect of realistic values of moments of inertia (MOIs) of top mass based on the current RAL detailed design. MOIs are sufficiently different from conceptual design that mode coupling in yaw no longer good.  Will work with RAL to iterate the design.
• Started work on updating the LSC authorlist

From: Janeen Romie <janeen@ligo-la.caltech.edu>

• Recycling Mirror Suspension: Greer has started a document comparing the mass requirements for the RM suspensions components. He's also making the structure more realistic with respect to mounting holes for Bob's brackets, and running the new configuration in Cosmos. The 1st mode is above 150 Hz. Bob is working on the details of the suspension assembly with respect to the earthquake stops for the recycling mirror.
• Output Mode Cleaner Suspension: The structure is at the x-ray shop for weld testing. It still needs more reworks after this. All of the other parts are being reworked and should be completed this week.

• Earthquake stops: Screw PO is with the machine shop with a due date of 3 weeks. Tips have been delivered to LLO.
• Worked on budgets and schedules with Norna.

From: k mailand kmailand@ligo.caltech.edu

• I have started the design of the zero expansion pick off telescope. After a few meetings with Phil, Riccardo, Aidan, and Mike Smith, to make it entirely out of  Zerodur material, with a suspension, and a thermo box around it is the current approach. There will be issues of handling, setup access, and alignment.
• Testing the faraday 4 wire style damper is in Phil Willems lab, is in progress.
• The preliminary assembly of the installation arm tool is in progress, also work on a test setup has started.

Core Optics

• Planning  the 2008 budget, reconciling 2007 plans, budgeting, and expenditures; preparing a CCB request for variances.

Auxiliary Optics

From: Michael Smith smith@ligo.caltech.edu

• OPTICAL LAYOUT FOR STABLE RC: Mike is in the process of making a layout of the stable recycling cavity, based on a power recycling cavity length = 55.815 m, and a signal recycling cavity length of 57.41 m. Apparently the lengths between PR1, PR2, and PR3 that are posted in the WIKI do not add up to 55.815. Guido & Muzammil indicated that they would revise the spacings and curvatures of those mirrors to achieve the desired Guoy phase after the layout was finalized.
• HARTMANN TELESCOPE STABILITY: Phil and Aidan made a preliminary estimate of the wavefront stability required by the Hartmann Telescope that will be used to probe the RC phase distortion within the CP and the ITM; the requirement is lambda/400. This results from requiring that the Telescope wavefront curvature stability be less than 1/10 of the estimated  lambda/40 temperature-induced phase variation at the ITM mirror. After a meeting with the AOS group, the consensus is that to achieve this stringent wavefront stability, the Hartmann telescope should be 1) fabricated entirely of Zerodur, 2) should be suspended, and 3) the entire telescope structure should be shielded thermally within a temperature-controlled housing.
• FY08 R&D COSTS: Mike and Phil are in the process of estimating R&D costs for the various AOS subsystems.

From: Phil Willems willems@ligo.caltech.edu

• Enhanced LIGO TCS: Tobin Fricke has sent to the mLIGO wiki a nice document outlining the intensity stabilization requirements and design for the Enhanced LIGO TCS laser, document # T0760224-00-D.  He continues to try to push down the excess noise in the photodetector amplifiers.  Aidan Brooks is assembling the mounting hardware to try out the axicons and has set up the thermal imaging camera to see the results once he finishes.  I am assembling a sturdier mount for the Syrad laser to reduce the jitter -- to conserve space on the TCS projector table the laser will be mounted upright and the polarization rotated into correct orientation using a nonplanar periscope.
• Advanced LIGO TCS: Aidan has performed some calculations that show that thermal defocus of the in-vacuum beam expanding telescope for the Hartmann sensor caused by room temperature fluctuations will exceed the required sensitivity unless the design of the telescope is radically changed.  Essentially, if the mirrors and mount of the telescope are made from identical materials, there will be no thermal defocus under homogeneous temperature changes.  So we are considering an all-Zerodur design.

Input Optics

From: David tanner@phys.ufl.edu

Guido Mueller:

• Working on ASC for Adv Ligo

Luke Williams:

• Assembling DLC mounts.
• Wrote hazard analysis and assembly procedure for FR.
• Preparing to assemble FR [AL note: effort was abort after one of the disks failed]

Kate Dooley and Antonio Lucianetti:

• We took IR measurements using 25W of a new FI configuration: the DKDP sits just after the 2nd CWP as opposed to just before. The isolation ratio improves significantly -- with HWP adjustment it's correctable to 44dB compared to 30dB.
• We also took several drift measurements at 25W. One setup looked at just the laser drift. Another isolated the intrinsic FI reflected beam thermal drift from that due to all of the optics before the FI. We concluded that the pre-FI optics do not have much of a contribution.
• Also, with Valera, we spent a day doing commissioning work in the LVEA. We measured the intensity profile of the laser beam at different powers on IOT1 and ISCT1. At 1 and 3W the beam was a nice gaussian, but it becomes flat-topped at 5W and distinctly non-gaussian at 7W. We suspect clipping due to thermal lensing effects.

Muzammil Arain:

• We received two re-polished TGG crystals. The Ar coating seems good and we have tested it at 30 W for 20 hours. No damage was seen. the thermal lensing measurements indicate a focal length of about 35 m per crystal. The FI assembly is being prepared for measuring rotation in magnetic field for these crystals.

Rodica Martin:

• Testing with Muzammil the TGG crystals from Northop Grumann for thermal lesing, AR coating reflectivity and high power damage (at 30W) for e-ligo. Preparing setup for measurements of rotation angle in magnetic field.

Other R&D

No report provided.

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For additional information about this report, contact Albert Lazzarini or Phil Lindquist