Weekly Report for Week Ending December 11, 2008

Past Weekly Reports

---

LSC Issues (Reitze)

News from the past few weeks:

• The LSC-Virgo Data Analysis Council has put together a set of principles and procedures guidelines for developing collaborations with external groups (e.g. astronomers, high energy neutrino physicists). This document proposes fundamental principles to guide L-V interactions with other communities and clarifies the responsibilities of L-V members when seeking to arrange partnerships. It also guides the policies of the LSC and Virgo Collaborations as a whole and provides a procedural framework for developing collaborations through MOU- or proposal-driven mechanisms.  The procedure can be found at https://www.lsc-group.phys.uwm.edu/ligovirgo/dac/policy/externalCollabsPolicy.txt
• The LSC has set up a web committee to develop and implement a new web architecture for the LIGO Lab and the LSC that will takes advantage of the common content and synergism between the Lab and the LSC web sites.  The Web Committee, made up of representatives from the LIGO Lab and the LSC, met earlier this month to begin the design.
• Within the past year the LSC and Virgo have successfully used EVO to allow LSC and Virgo scientists to watch and participate in meetings without actually having to travel to the physical location. A LSC remote participation group has developed a white paper which has been circulated to the NSF for further developing the capabilities of EVO as an L-V collaboration tool.  A proposal is being written  to request funds from NSF for the further EVO development.
• The S5 burst paper "Search for Gravitational Wave Bursts from Soft Gamma Repeaters" was published online in the 21 November 2008 issue of Physical Review Letters (Vol.101, No.21): http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v101/e211102 The S4 burst paper "First joint search for gravitational-wave bursts in LIGO and GEO600 data was published online in 27 November 2008 issue of Classical and Quantum Gravity: http://stacks.iop.org/0264-9381/25/245008.

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

STATUS OF LSC MOUs (Lloyd)

• For status of MOUs press here.

PROPERTY ACCOUNTING (Luna)

• No report.

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

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

• Continued to work on a couple of DocDB issues.

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Funaro, Oracion)

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

• For ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY Press Here.

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

• [Distributed the financial reports for the end of November, and we are preparing for the Financial Review of LIGO Operations scheduled for Monday, December 15, in the meeting of the Executive Committee.  Materials will be distributed. –pel] 
• Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport. (For passwords contact Karl)

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Arvizu, Jasnow, Salone)

>From: Rudy Arvizu <arvizu_r@ligo.caltech.edu>

• See Advanced LIGO report.

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

• The new contract for the University of Florida Operations portion is being prepared.  This will be the new contract under the new Operations Cooperative Agreement.
• See Advanced LIGO report.

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

• See Advanced LIGO report.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

• The monthly report for LIGO Operations is due to the NSF on Monday, December 15.  We have contributions for all sections and are assembling the report.

CHANGE REQUESTS (Lindquist)

• There are no open change requests.

HUMAN RESOURCES (Akutagawa)

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

• The next Staffing Committee meeting is scheduled for Monday, January 12th.
• A Staffing Committee meeting was held on Monday, December 8th.  The minutes and action items will be posted on the SC web page.

---

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

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

• Some time spent dealing with a few minor safety issues, some time spent working with Advanced LIGO Safety and QA engineers and Advanced LIGO procurement requirements.

 

---

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

Summary of Activities at LIGO Hanford Observatory
(compiled by K. Kawabe)

eLIGO

• For some time we couldn't set the TCSX power smaller than 1W with nominal AOM drive voltage. This was because of the fact that the polarization of the CO2 laser was not what it is supposed to be after passing the AOM, and an additional polarizer was installed later for a quick mitigation of the effect.
• Prior to the above mentioned fix, a new way to assess the TCS heating pattern using the contrast defect in the Michelson dark fringe was tested. Y arm was excellent, but X was not.
• The power scaling for the OMC is working very well.
• The WFS sensing matrix looks stable against 15pm DARM offset at 7.4W.
• Some trouble with the binary I/O for switching the trans impedance of the OMC transmission PD, which seemed to have been fixed by Rolf's code change.
• Following LLO's measurement, the beam jitter of the laser beam coming into OMC was measured.
• An IR image showed that the number of point scattering of 4k ETMY was reduced, but a wide vertical streak pattern newly appeared, after the removal and cleaning of the optic for magnet replacement.
• The OMC transmission PD sometimes bursts into fast oscillation. The exact mechanism of this is unknown yet.

Astrowatch (A. Mullavey)

• Seismic activity was our main constraint this week, with the microseism rising up to 1um/s on Tuesday, and earthquakes consistently knocking the IFO out of lock over the weekend.
• Despite these disturbances, H2 was up 58.4% of the time and in science mode 28.8% of the time. Most of the time the inspiral range has been between 7 and 7.5 Mpc. However it has been as low as 6 Mpc during the times the microseism was high.
• There has been a lot of talk this week about the SGR (Soft Gamma Repeater) events that occurred between late August and early September, and about analyzing the A5 data from that time.

Outreach (D. Ingram)

• EOC Ingram gave a brief LIGO presentation at the annual Okanogan Valley GEAR UP Advisory Board meeting in Chelan, WA on 12/5. LHO has undertaken several joint activities with these northern WA GEAR UP sites since 2006.

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

General: South Louisiana had a rare snow storm that began early Thursday morning.  In an area with no snow plows, and no salt or sand trucks, it had the expected result.  Many of our staff could not safely make it to work, or were required to attend to their children or electricity-free homes.  This report is therefore shorter than usual.

• Enhanced LIGO commissioning has continued; next week's report will include this weeks' work.
• I'm very pleased to announce that Shyang Wen successfully defended his Ph.D. dissertation at LSU on December 11th, on the topic of HEPI commissioning and its effect on the S4/S5 L1 detector.  Once his committee-requested edits are made, look for it in the new DCC.

LLO CDS Software (Keith Thorne):

• Upgrades:
  • Installed GDS upgrades (new computers, OS upgrades) (John Zweizig).
  • Installed modified OMC Tip-Tilt board (Carl Adams, Jay Heefner, David Kinzel).
  • Purchased cables, adapters to complete LDAS work.
• Commissioning Support:
  • Corrections to conlog package.
• Sys-Admin:
  • Migration of GC ports (web server, GDS machines) to LLO-managed IPs.
  • Corrected front-end code causing persistent EPICS log errors.
  • Security, configuration management discussions (Abe Singer, David Barker).
  • Regular rsync of main file server to hot backup restored.

LLO Education and Outreach

(Kathy Holt)

• Conducted one group visit  of 56 students.
• Worked on flyer for Feb. workshop.
• Spoke with Marcia from LaSIP about future University projects.  Discuss guidelines for professional development training at the SEC.
• Conference call with Lori and Anna at the Teacher Institute to discuss workshop content, and teacher sub-pay, travel and classroom supplies.
• Scheduled public tours.
• Prepared for LPSB meeting to be held on Fri. 12/12/08 at 10:00.
• Worked on public tour calendar for website.
• Attended the BRAS meeting Monday night as a LIGO representative.  discussed a future meeting to be held at LIGO.
• Collected and organized student surveys and data from Copper Mill.  Created a excel file for Lisa Szetcher and SEC.
• Worked on programs for away school  visits for large groups (200) students or more.

(Amber Stuver)

• Gave control room tours to ~50 5th grade students.
• Answered questions for a short film on the SEC (along with Kathy Holt) for use by the funding organization which distributes funds for teacher professional development.
• The beta test of my measurement tool to establish the effectiveness of the SEC's informal learning environment in resolving students' misconceptions dealing with waves and gravity has been postponed due snow - in Louisiana!  I would like to have this educational research fully underway starting early next semester.

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 also Advanced LIGO

Controls and Data Systems (Bork)

See Advanced LIGO

40-Meter Interferometer (Adhikari)

• After the MZ and MC alignment work, the drum head modes of the MC mirrors became visible in the noise without artificial excitation. The MC error signal is down converted by a lock-in amplifier and sampled into the DAQ system. Caryn is working on making a monitor program to track the frequency change.
• Alberto and Caryn are working on the calibration of the RF-AM monitor after the MC. For the first step, they calibrated the "Janne laser" (a small diode laser with RF amplitude modulation capability). They found a strange notch in the transfer function. Also the transfer function had ripples due to reflection from impedance mismatch. They are now using the beat from the PLL system for the abs. length measurement for the calibration.
• A mag 5.1 earthquake on the Friday night (Dec. 5) tripped most of the optics. Inspections by free swinging spectra observed no major damage. However, the earthquake seemed to kick the ITMY-UL OSEM back to normal, where it had been outputting zero for a few weeks. Now the IFO mirrors are re-aligned and locks in DRMI.
• The rough pump for TP2, which is the foreline pump for the main turbo, failed on Monday. It was replaced with a spare.

---

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

• One of the mephisto lasers is back from the manufacturer, and we expect to take delivery of the other shortly. Both have been refurbished with new pump diodes and retrofitted with PZT actuators. When originally purchased, Lightwave held the patent on attaching a PZT crystal to the NPRO cavity, and Innolight could not sell units with PZTs inside the United States. Since then the patent has expired, and more choices are now available to us on the market. This is good because the Innolight lasers typically display a free-running frequency noise that is a factor of ten lower than the Lightwaves, 10Hz/rtHz at 100Hz, as opposed to 100Hz/rtHz.
• Greg Ogin has also been looking at on options for servicing our older Lightwave 126es. Lightwave has been reluctant to service the older models, after being bought by JDS Uniphase, and just letting them die when the pump diodes burn out - the most common failure mode and one that is virtually inevitable for these NPROs - is not a attractive option. Peter King has found suppliers of compatible pump diodes, so we may be able to replace them ourselves. However, alignment can be problematic, and having a manufacturer do the servicing would probably be both faster and more cost effective. We are still in talks with Lightwave, and results will be reported if and when we reach an agreement. We have also approached Innolight about servicing Lightwave lasers.

---

LASTI (Mittleman)

BSC-ISI

• We have designed 6 and tested 6 of the BSC HEPI controllers. There are more details and plots on the Lasti ilog (www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog <http://www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog> Lasti Group page) on Monday December 8th. We have not yet installed the sensor correction filters so the performance  is limited.
• We vented Lasti this week and started a round of modal identification. We are hoping to be able to identify the lowest Quad/ISI modes (<120Hz) with an eye towards a damping solution for them.

Quad Prototype

• The stand-offs have been glued (vac-seal) to the test mass. The3y span the existing ears and will allow the test mass to be hung from metal wire loops, which is planned for next month. Brett has made a series of ilog entries detailing the process (www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog <http://www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog> Lasti Group page), over this week. There is a link to some pictures included (http://web.mit.edu/~bshapiro/
  Public/Quad_Noise_Prototype_Pictures/Metal_Prism_Test_Mass_Dec08/).
• Also Alan Cummings has been visiting from Glasgow. He has been working on the fiber characterization and pulling tooling. He has written a manual on the use of the fiber profiler which is currently on the Lasti ilog (www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog <http://www.ligo.mit.edu/ilog> Lasti Group page), on Thursday,December 11th.

SEI

• The new HAM support beams have been installed and are now being supported by the HEPI offload springs. Myron is reinstalling the HEPI actuators after which will be able to test the performance of the new

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

________________

Chad Hanna:

• I have been preparing the high mass search for the meeting next week.

________________

Antony Searle:

• Reanalyzing figures of merit for PRC.
• Producing sim data for PRC at GWDAW.
• Preparing presentations for LVC/AAS/GWDAW.

________________

Diego Fazi:

• Re-ran and re-analyzed results from a SPA bank-simulation using the new HEAD of LAL/LALAPPS.
• Re-submitted a PTF bank-simulation using the new HEAD of LAL/LALAPPS

________________

Amber L. Stuver:

• Finished a method to determine the physicality of a detection delay given a third detector based on the time delay of an initial pair.  This is the final step towards finishing the wrapper on my source location estimation wrapper which allows for error in the timing of the delays.

________________

Anand Sengupta:

• Running 2 month injection runs (high mass) - Phenom + SpinTaylor T3 on atlas.
• Modifying lalapps_tmpltbank to make it run faster.
• Modifying lalapps_inspiral to make banksim jobs run much faster.

________________

Kent Blackburn for the Grid Computing R&D Team:

GRID APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT

• Attended Inspiral, DASWG, OSG-Production telecons.
• Wrote agenda and led LIGO-Pegasus, OSG-VO-Group telecon.
• Wrote minutes for LIGO-Pegasus telecon.
• Updated DASWG pages with new information regarding Einstein@Home   statistics and Inspiral Activity.

EINSTEIN AT HOME ON THE GRID ACTIVITIES

• gt2/gt4 deployment at 4 additional sites successful (10 new sites all together).
• Fermilab has nfs issues,  contacted Steve, need to re-deploy code.
• Daily manual cleanup st WS-GRAM sites.
• GT2 test runs at 10 new  sites:
  • Logs don't come back automatically.
  • Jobs run and finished as DONE, RC=0, but state=executing, error staging out files?

BINARY INSPIRAL APPLICATION ON THE GRID ACTIVITIES

• Install 32/64 bit binaries (need to confiugure lal/lalapps with options --with-gcc-flags --disable-xml) (12/04).
• Added LIGO_UWM_NEMO, OSG_LIGO_MIT to ldg-sites.xml and committed to cvs.
• Ran SPEW code on RCAC site successful.
• Ran ihope high mass search successfully (Dec 11, runtime 6hours 40mins ):
  • gps times: 874000000-874010000
  • [sites] - imrinj=OSG_LIGO_MIT (via Pegasus) - phenominj=LIGO_UWM_NEMO (via Pegasus) - eobinj=cit (via Pegasus) - spininj=cit (via Pegasus) - playground=local - full_data=local.
  • Obtained new Pegasus code from  nighty build on 12/05.

OSG INTEGRATION AND VALIDATION TESTBED

• No Report from Robert this week.

GRID MANAGEMENT

• Continued to work on all aspects of the OSG All-Hands Meeting - develop agenda - invite speakers - contact photographer - orchestrate program committee and solve issues - work on issues with the meeting website through website developer.
• Continued to work on Caltech Office of Sponsored Research Issues with OSG SOW.
• Organized and held OSG Council Meeting on Tuesday - wrote up posted meeting minutes.
• Met with Britta and Chad to develop a long term strategy for running binary inspiral jobs on the OSG in a way that is meaningful to that analysis.
• Met with Britta and Robert to discuss progress on migrating Einstein@Home Jobs over to Globus Toolkit 2 GRAM.
• Continued to process a large number of new request for DOE Grids User certificates, and LAMS accounts and the associated array of problems users experience with these.
• Communicated on several levels with the OSG about the statistics of the Einstein@Home jobs and OSG contributions to this search.

________________

Joseph Betzwieser:

• Worked on 2nd year Crab search.  Worked on AAS meeting poster.  Also helped Andrew Melatos get a short ComputeFStatistic_v2 search running on the grid.

________________

Peter Kalmus:

• Poster for S5y1 SGR search at TEXAS 2008.
• Preparations for stacking search talk at LVC meeting.
• Circulated GWDAW 13 abstract for stacking pipeline to burst group.
• Started A5 data quality effort for SGR 0501+4516 search.
• Continuing work on stacking methods paper.

Laboratory Computing (Anderson)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

• A week's worth of work revealed several flaws in the code which detects NFS file systems being unavailable. Although the code is not yet in CVS, it is on a tandem system and is working. It will be part of the development branch by early next week.
• Read the latest draft of the version 8 frame specification and reported to Benoit and Stuart that there were no technical issues with the specification. Next week work should resume on implementing this frame specification in frameCPP.
• System testing was done using version 1.11.49 of the software. The Lsync test failed. Also, there were two regression tests that failed. One of the jobs that failed was because of an invalid user. This issue has been addressed. The second failure as because a frame file was not found. As of yet, this failure has not been investigated.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech

(Dan Kozak)

• Weekly check of frame files in CIT cluster found no new bad frames.
• Did more NFS work on the test system for Ed Maros.
• Mailed back broken 6140 controller to Sun.
• Got Sun to come pack up the loaner STK10000A drives (still need to get them shipped).
• Got Sun to come get the stuck tape out of one of the 9940B drives in the SL8500 silo.
• Continued work on rearchiving data to T10KB format tapes.
• Gave Fred Donovan at MIT some info about LDR.
• Got Phil to sort out MIT's certs so they'll be able to run LDR.
• Tried to help Britta track down an RLS problem she was having.

(Phil Ehrens)

• Large number of new GRID users were given access to the cluster this week.
• Usual tasks associated with host and service certs.
• Swapped drives from failing 2U ldasbox2 machine into old OSG cluster node.
• Installed VMware onto machine ldasdata4 and configured a Slackware and a CentOS virtual server. The CentOS virtual server is intended for testing as an LDAP service replica.

MIT

(Fred Donovan)

• Spoke with Dan re: LDR for overview.

Livingston

(Igor Yakushin)

• The PDU plug and the outlet for nodes 135-142 got burned. After they were replaced, the nodes came back.
• The PDU plug for nodes 143-150 got hot and was disconnected. These nodes are currently down.
• We are considering what to do before the cluster upgrade. One possibility is to install extra circuits so that we can reduce the current in each circuit. Better monitoring hardware is needed as well.
• The publishing scripts at LLO went down because diskcacheAPI got confused by node shutdown. It was fixed by removing the corresponding entries for the nodes from the diskcacheAPI configuration file and restarting diskcacheAPI.
• The publishing scripts at LHO stopped working because the symbolic link to the certificate directory got changed (as a result of automatic VDT certificate upgrade?). I fixed the symbolic link and restarted the publishing scripts.
• Replaced 18 tapes in the library.

(Doug Lormand)

• I've been in the control room this week but each day at the end of my shift I have checked temperatures in the LDAS room. The temperatures have been ok since the AC was turned back on. The hot plug I found is still a little hotter then the rest, but only 100 degrees instead of 160 degrees. Most of the rest of the plugs are high 80s to low 90s. The circuit with the hot plug still needs to be traced.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT

(Fred)

• Installed new nessus scanner.
• Ran some scans.
• Added some security to rsync backups (rsync-verify).
• Installed mbsa (microsoft's security analyzer) on two xp machines, reporting to nagios.
• Shipped nova (opteron) for warranty repair.
• Some nfs security tuning tubera (req. priv. port for nfs).
• Cloned xp machine for archive (sgras's).
• Installed new emvogil-3(centos), set up calcium calendars on it.

Hanford

(Christian)

• Mary Kurts - Replaced hard drive and power adapter.
• Dan Moraru - Installed and configured new system for Dan.
• Created backup of Windows 2003 servers.
• Terry Santini - Can't print. Installed new printer drivers.
• Mark Lubinski - Configured laptop with Windows Xp for Mark.
• Re-configured Powerbook G4 that was returned to LHO from visitor.
• Dale Ingram - Can't map network drives and print. Installed security registry key and new printer drivers.
• Replaced 5-port switch in the conference room.
• Replaced workstation from Mac to Windows in the conference room.
• Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Larry)

• Worked on a couple of different contract renewals with Gina and others.
• Started rework of backup scripts. Performed tests that were successful now just have to implement the full set.
• Minor work on user accounts.
• Preparing a list of items for the new sysadmin that will be starting soon.
• Worked out logistics on travel for different people over the next few months. These are to cover Advanced LIGO items as well as help the new sysadmin.

Caltech

(Christian)

• Calum Torrie - Installed new webcam Xp software.

(Mike)

• Updated patches on altair. There were some kernel errors, and the patches seemed to have fixed this issue.
• Order additional equipment for video conferencing, plus other items for users.
• Worked on updating/testing WebcamXP in both conference rooms as another alternative for sharing the desktop remotely. EVO had some problems with sharing the desktop when many users were connected to one of the meetings. Christian gave me a hand with this.
• Finished up loading a laptop for a new user. Also setup this users office with a docking station and external monitor. I installed additional software, and showed user where to backup her data too "home account", plus other network services that are offered to users.
• Setup new user accounts.
• Cleaned up our old remote control room pulling out network cables, switches, and security camera to have this ready for a new user.
• Ghosted a new laptop to get ready for another new user. Now installing additional software that user is going to need.
• Started working on an Engineering workstation for a new user.
• Work on a users laptop that was running sluggish. I was able to fix this issue and backup the users data.
• Other onsite/phone user support and misc. sysadmin work.

(Veronica)

• WebComm -- A follow-up of the meeting -- presented to the group a plan for development of a list of specs.
• PAC website updates.
• LSC -- Updates of the database of technical papers.
• CaJAGWR -- Videotaped the last talk, compressed for streaming. Updates of the group's website.
• Sydney -- EVO assistance.

(Melody)

• Worked on enhancement requests and bug fixes for DocDB.
• Manually added administrative personnel in the  DocDB users table.

(Larry)

• Multiple purchases taken care of. Most for new people arriving at the different locations. A couple of items for different labs. Reworked the Calcium licenses to remove some of the confusion on who owns what. We have our new license and MIT should receive theirs soon. Going over a number of future purchases for new A/V equipment, new servers, core network box replacement. Checking on some s/w pricing for different people.
• Reworked a number of accounts for different people. All just minor items, to change their environment.
• Cleaned up some of the cabling and removed some of the outdated equipment from the computer room.
• Took care of a couple of network issues. All turned out to be mis-configured setting on the computer.
• Worked some file transfers in order to get one of the backup servers upgraded. A few minor hiccups but it worked out and the data is now all on tape where it should be.
• Working on SSL certificates for another one of the ligo.org servers. Cindy from PSU has been handling most of the work on this unit.
• Setup new users accounts and related work.
• Worked with Mike and others on different conference room setups.
• Started work on a new server to replace our outdated internal doc server.
• Regular user assistance and s/w installs which was a little more than usual this past week.

Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

Advanced LIGO Systems

From: Calum Torrie <ctorrie@ligo.caltech.edu>

Doc DB:

• We continue to update the docDB help files and engineering workflow as well as field questions from various locations on the use of the new system. These will be added to a Q&A section. At next weeks Systems meeting, 9am PT, we will go through the detailed opto-mechanical engineering workflow.
• DocDB - Engineering Workflow: https://dcc.ligo.org/wiki/index.php/Engineering_Workflow
• DocDB help and how to get started guide: https://dcc.ligo.org/wiki/index.php/Getting_DocDB_Help

PDMWorks:

• We have started work on cleaning up the vault. The first groups to start a spring clean are AOS and SUS (Glasgow). We are working on re-naming, moving, updating, transfer to trash and then supervised delete. This will be extended to other groups and then we will start a re-organisation of the vault view a view to creating a layout of all of the detectors.
• PDMWorks training will take place in January with representatives from all of the relevant sites (LLO, LHO, MIT, Florida and Caltech). The dates for everyone is the 21st and 22nd of January with additional dates for the administrators.

AMD's and Gold Barrel Sleeve:

• I have been working with Phil Willems and the SUS team (Norna and Alastair) on an updated barrel sleeve with more coverage. At the same time I have been discussing Acoustic Mode damper locations with Matt Evans and Peter F.

2 Layer Coating:

• Liam Cunningham and I are running a series of 2 layer coating FEA for Peter F. We have now identified one or two  discrepancies between our FEA models and are currently running cases for different beam diameters and improved mesh (refinement of the optic face).

Draft Prism concept for SUS:

• I worked on a draft layout (with Norna, Ken and Helena) of the prisms for both the HLTS and HSTS for suspensions. These are available at the following location: https://dcc.ligo.org/cgi-bin/private/DocDB/
  ShowDocument?docid=144

Modeling and Simulation

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

AdvLIGO COC Design (Hiro)

• Compared losses for different beam sizes on ITM. It is summarized in G0810029.
• The signal loss with he current choice of 5.55cm is 0.5% for the cavity formed by SRM and X arm, which suffered the BS geometrical loss the most.
• The effect of the beam off centering and the loss for the power recycled Michelson part is going, as well as the contrast defect due to the different BS geometrical shadowing effect.

eLIGO Commissioning Support (Hiro, Rana)

• Based on my calculation of the ITM thermal state dependence of the reference beam for the OMC, Rana calculated the mode matching change at OMC, and revised the document (T0810007). The loss can range from a few % to O(10%) due to the miscalibration of the MMT in front of the OMC. The ITM thermal state dependence of the loss O(15%) was observed at LLO.

Static IFO Simulation (Hiro)

• The SIS document and example codes are updated to demonstrate how to use the simulation for the study of the thermal lensing effect.

Mechanical Simulation for Advanced LIGO (Sany and SLU team)

• Started to model ASC (Angular sensing Control) of AdvLIGO Input Mode Cleaner (IMC). To this end, changed the maximum transverse mode order of the PSL model from the plane wave mode to the first order (TEM00, 01 and 10), and confirmed that the current IMC model equipped with the length/frequency control servos locks the IMC stably with this PSL modes. Using the Wavefront Sensor (WFS) models we previously made for the Initial LIGO IMC, started to include ASC models to the current AdvLIGO IMC model. It took a while to check various settings (the WFS RF Demodulator's map etc), but confirmed that the ASC sub-module itself is operational.

Safety

From: David Nolting   dnolting@ligo-la.caltech.edu

• The LIGO safety team has completed the Contractor Safety Requirements and Contractor Safety Evaluation forms, and will be placed in the DCC, with links provided on the main LIGO Safety page and AdL Safety Wiki page.
• Safe work conditions are being monitored at the LLO construction site.  Conditions are satisfactory at this time.
• Received the Safety Program from Apollo Sheet Metal, for the work activities at LHO.  No comments at this time…still reviewing the written safety plan. 
• Participated in the JIRA Defect Tracking Web-cast on 12/10, hoping to capitalize on ideas for safety issue tracking.
• Continuing to review HAM-ISI safety requirements that will support assembly and installation activities.

Quality Assurance

From: Mick Flanigan flanigan_m@ligo-wa.caltech.edu

Defect tracking:

• JIRA software is approaching full configuration, will be ready to begin loading Projects and Component in bulk next week. Configurations this week included:
  • Designing the security scheme to allow for controlled access to sensitive projects, if any.
  • Creates Global User Groups: Allows users to be assigned to a distinct collection around some functional area. Exanple: LHO O&M, SUS Team, SEI Team, etc.
  • Created Project Roles: LSC Guests, LIGO Users, Project Admins, System Admins, QA Team, Safety Team.
  • Designed several workflows (business processes) within JIRA to control steps a reported issue type must follow. For example, if a safety item is reported, the LIGO safety workflow will be followed, requiring all resolved safety issues to pass through Safety team review before closing.
  • Implemented Email notification schemes. Goal was to alert JIRA users of new issues and status changes, but to limit the audience to those with a stake in the issue. Example: an issue reported on a TCS component at LHO will be sent to the AOS team and the LHO O&M team, but no other groups or users will be notified of the issue unless they specifically choose to watch items reported as AOS, or at LHO, etc.
• We had training this week for several users who will also be acting as leads for a specific system for the JIRA database. QA will be following up in the next week with each attendee to ensure they are comfortable taking ownership of admin roles for their system. This week also had the opportunity to share details on JIRA with the LHO team, and received some excellent feedback. Several areas of concern came forward, mainly around difficulty of learning another software, how is this going to benefit us, etc. What I can say is that those who have spent minimal time with me looking at the system and understanding its function have tol me they really like it and it is very simple to use. Over the next month I will be developing a training package for users, and will begin delivering to all LIGO team members in January.

Inventory Database:

• Dwayne has continued to work on the database, but he is also being pulled to work on several other projects at this time and we are slipping on schedule. The SEI group had asked that we are able to perform imports into the database by the end of this week, and we still hope this is ready as promised.
• Participated in a conference call with the VIRGO team and had a chance to look at their inventory solution. Looked very nice, and it looks like their requirements were driven by system interconnects, while our system is driven by load management, location tracking. Potentially there is an opportunity for us to marriage these and create a very thorough inventory system for both teams. We will have further talks with them in January to demo the LIGO system.

Discrepant Materials:

• Due to a recent discrepant materials find, we have gone back to M080331-01, Advanced LIGO Supplier QA Requirements, and have made some edits to the document to better illustrate our handling of these types of issues. The discrepant material is now under review by the AdLIGO team.

Facilities Modifications and Preparations

From: John Worden <worden_j@ligo-wa.caltech.edu>

• Nothing to report this week.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason kmason@ligo.mit.edu

SEI Project Activities

• Stephany and Ken attended JIRA Defect Management System: Administrator Training.

HAM ISI Design and Documentation:

• A Final Design Review for the single stage ham is scheduled for 12/19/2008. All team members are working on documentation for this review.
• Two candidates for a draftsman to help with drawings and documentation were interviewed this week.

HEPI Procurement:

• HEPI Pump Stations--Still waiting for the Manifold, the Resistor polished-washers and some pipe fitting welding.  Some assembly however is being done.
• Actuators--Approved redesign of the Sensor Holster for use of spherical spindle micrometer.  Shop continues--see LIGO-T0810036 in DocDB for shop status(current to 4 Dec). ~Hugh R.
• The purchase requisition for the HEPI miscellaneous machined parts is being held up by project management for re-approval by the NSF.

HAM Crossbeam Redesign:

• New Crossbeams fully installed in LASTI's X-end HAM. Next steps include resetting HEPI Actuators and powering up the system - this is expected to be completed mid-to-late next week.

BSC ISI Development:

• BSC-HEPI:  Feedback control loops have been installed on HEPI. We are currently using low  frequency blend (~0.2HZ) on vertical loops and high frequency blend on horizontal control loops (~1HZ). All the 6 unit get frequencies are set up at or close to 10Hz. Next step is to implement sensor correction. ~Fabrice

Suspensions

From Janeen Romie and Norna Robertson
(romie_j@ligo-la.caltech.edu, nroberts@ligo.caltech.edu)

Operations Work

HAM Suspensions for Advanced & Enhanced LIGO:

• Creating RFQ drawing packages for the large triple mechanical parts.
• Work ongoing to provide responses to the reviewers triple suspensions PDR questions.

BSC suspensions for Advanced LIGO:

• RAL reported that parts for the training session will arrive in one box, around December 17-19, depending on Customs.
• Work ongoing to align personnel for the quad wire hang at LASTI 12 - 23 Jan., the PDMWorks class in Woodland Hills 21 - 22 Jan and the quad training session at LLO 26 Jan - 6 Feb.

Project-Funded Activities

• RFQ packages for the solid stack assembly tooling went out Monday. Questions are being fielded.
• Reviewed the Risk Register for SUS and provided input to Project Management.

Core Optics

From: GariLynn Billingsley <Billingsley_G@ligo.caltech.edu>

• Project We have received all glass blanks for ETM, FM and RM.  Thus the Corning contract is complete.  The first shipment of Low OH fused silica has been shipped from Germany.  We have the data for the three ITMs in this shipment.  One of the ITMs has two bubbles which exceed the maximum bubble size in our specification.  The total cross sectional area of bubbles is well within our specification and, more importantly, the bubbles are outside of the beam foot print.  Preliminary discussions amongst the technical staff indicate this should be acceptable.
• The Heraeus contract has been signed.
• The RFP for polishing has been sent, with all companies acknowledging receipt.  Responses are due January 9th.

Auxiliary Optics

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

Work Under Project Budget

OPTICAL LAYOUT:

• Luke made a preliminary layout of the folded IFO HAM 8--things are tight, but he thinks he can get the Faraday isolator in. He is working on determining the calcite wedge polarizer wedge angle for FI. Mike added the new ZEMAX layout of the ETM telescope and Transmon table into the non-folded IFO layout.

TCS:

• Phil reports that all TCS electronics are working at both sites. He is awaiting installation of a chassis and interface boards that Mohanna made. TCS on H1 has been upgraded sufficiently to enable operation of the  interferometer with 21W input to the mode cleaner, essentially full  power.  This is a significant milestone.
• Many issues regarding TCS remain to be resolved.  We have discovered  that heating the ITMs with ~1W of power during a Michelson lock causes  significant tilt of the optic observable both with the optical levers  and with the OSEM sensors.  This may be due to  heat-induced curvature  of the optic, differential expansion of the mirror with respect to its  center of gravity, or thermally-induced changes in the separation of  the OSEM and PAM magnets.  It is not clear whether this effect will  impair interferometer performance during full lock.
• Normalized SPOB cannot stay stably above ~60% of its low-power value  during high power operation.  This may suggest that the annulus  pattern is not ideal and is not fully compensating the IFO thermal  lens.  We are analyzing this possibility using finite element models. We discovered that the AOM was depolarizing the CO2 beam in the x-arm TCS at LHO. This was corrected by placing an additional polarizer in the beam after the AOM, so that the rotating polarizer power attenuator regained its normal extinction ratio.
• The free-running TCS laser noise is now visible in H1 DARM, especially  from TCSX, so it is time to activate the TCS ISS and start squelching  noise peaks.

Work Under Operations Budget

ETM TELESCOPE SUS:

• Virginio and Ken have outlined a plan for the suspension testing that will begin this week. The test will include measuring the stray magnetic fields in the vicinity of the eddy current magnets that might affect the ETM Quad suspension.

ETM TELESCOPE:

• Mike is working on the design of a refractive ETM telescope that works at the dual wavelengths, 1064 and 532 nm, as an alternative to the off-axis parabolic design. He published a technical note describing the design and performance of the ETM pupil relay, which images the output aperture of the ETM telescope onto the ISC QPD. See https://dcc.ligo.org/cgi-bin/private/DocDB/ShowDocument?docid=135 He redesigned the Transmon optical table layout to be horizontal with the telescope and optics on the underside of the suspended table.

Input Optics

From: Rodica Martin <rmartin@phys.ufl.edu>

ELIGO Commissioning (LLO)

• We performed z-scan measurements on the REFL table at 0.5 W and 14 W to understand how the Faraday Isolator acts 'in situ' under LIGO conditions. The fitting of the data to a gaussian propagation equation gave an M2 of 0.99 at both power levels. The data show no sign of thermal lensing effects.Clean-up of  HPLF for future IO AdvLIGO experiments. (Antonio)

ALIGO Design

• We analyzed the effect on thermal lensing in the ITM substrate due to barrel coating on the ITM mirrors if we are not using TCS on the compensation plate. We are looking for new materials for ring heater adaptive system in IOO chain. We have found a new type of glass from schott that may work better. We are in the process of ordering some pieces for experiments. (Muzammil)
• We worked on electronics and board design for discrete quadrant photodiodes/wavefront sensors. Worked on parallel modulation MZ experiment.
• We performed high power investigation of absorption in Advanced LIGO modulator RTP crystals.
• We worked on AdvLIGO MC pre/initial alignment requirements and auto-alignment scheme. (Volker)
• We updated folded layout with new 4 SOS layout in HAM8. We are working on determining calcite wedge polarizer wedge angle for FI. (Luke)
• We are working on the coating damage testing experiment. Chased ghost beams and dumped properly and optimized transmission losses for high power operation. Power and beam diameter measurements at the location of the test mirror show that we can deliver light intensities higher than 1.9 MW/cm2. The beam diameter was measured using an AR coated pick-off FS plate placed right after the focussing lens. Next we'll be placing PDs for beam monitoring. (Rodica)

Prestabilized Laser

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

Operations

• Following on from last week's adventures with the 10-W laser, the software trick to fool the laser power supply was attempted and it failed.  Which raises the question of whether the problem is with the serial port used to communicate with the laser power supply, or the power supply itself. An RS-232 tester has been obtained.

Project

• More characteristic measurements were done to refine the JFET PSpice model.  So far, so good.  Sort of.  A few calculated predictions are off, which is probably a reflection of the model.  However as it is, the model is certainly workable and is probably within component tolerances.
• A spare 35-W front end laser is nearing completion.  A number of investigations at LZH have shown that the Glan-Laser polarisers used in the laser are sensitive to humidity.  The polarisers were re-epoxied and this improved things by a factor of 10.  The polarised output under went about 1 mrad of deviation for a 10-50% change in relative humidity.  This results in about a 5 W change in the output power of the laser.
• The base plate for the 200-W laser will be made of the same stainless steel alloy as the PSL table in order to have the same thermal expansion properties.

Control and Data Systems

From: Vern Sandberg <sandberg@ligo-wa.caltech.edu>

Reports from the Observatories

LHO

• Programing rotation stages to get them off the front end CPUs. HEPI procurement and fielding electrical questions from contractors. Work on setting up "EPICS Gateways" to relieve and control channel requests from clients to CDS computers, such as IOOL0, to relieve traffic related crashes. Contnue commissioning activities on OM1 and OM2 computers and allocation of control tasks.

LLO

• Update of GDS machines. Interfacing MS Windows-based FMCS contros to EPICS system. Installed modified OMC Tip-Tilt board. Migration of GC ports (web server, GDS machines) to LLO-managed IPs Corrected front-end code causing persistent EPICS log errors Preparations for Dec. 20-21, 2008 "mini-engineering run".

Sub-System Reports

OMC:

• Modification to the OMC hardware shutter box to allow it to sense if the trigger PD cable is removed.   If the trigger PD is disconnected from the shutter box, the shutter defaults to a triggered state now. Parts to LLO for OMC DCPD bias voltage increase.  Working with people at LLO to get a measurement of bias noise coupling to DC readout.

AdvLIGO SEI:

• A review of the ISI watchdog has been scheduled and a wiki established to collect documentation and to facilitate announcements.   (A separate, general watch dog design which locates the control relay in the advLIGO AI chasis is in progress.) HEPI Pump Servo chassis workover and redesign.  To be sent to LLO for their pump test stand.

AdvLIGO SUS:

• The US portions of the Quad Test Stand at LLO are installed, tested and operational. The components (US) for the LHO test stand are complete and the test stand has been run and tested at CIT for several weeks. The PDR of the Triple suspension is in progress and we are in the process of responding to comments and questions from the reviewers. Another meeting is scheduled for Dec. 16. The components for the RM test stand at LLO are complete and ready to be tested at CIT. These tests will occur right after the first of the year.

AdvLigo ISC:

• The AdvLIGO prototype RFPD is at the board manufacturer and due back next week.   The design is functional at the SPICE simulation level in accordance with the ISC conceptual design for zero detuned IFO conditions.  Next stop, the real world evaluation. Testing is underway on the AdvLIGO I&Q Demodulator prototype for ISC.  The design is functional over the intended bandwidth, and is being evaluated for detection linearity using the same testing method as the initial LIGO I&Q demodulator. The prototype AdvLIGO PEEK in-vacuum cable clamp was modified per comments and sent back to the machine shop for changes.  The revised version has a greater range of adjustability to accommodate different size and geometry cables.

AdvLIGO CDS-DAQ:

• We are in process of designing an interface for the timing board being provided by Columbia. This interface will connect the clock signals, duotone signal, gates, etc. to the various ADCs and DACs within the IO chassis (Blue Box). We are working with the prototype IO chassis fabricated by Hamilton and are accumulating and list of changes and additions for the next generation.

AdvLIGO In-vacuum Systems:

• Putting together the specifications for a custom in-vacuum hermetic connector to be used with the in-vacuum LSC PD, and ASC PD. Still working on High Reliability Electronics note.

AdvLigo Power and Timing:

• Noise power spectra from five different VI-power converter modules were presented.   The conducted and radiated LF and RF noise spectra for loads corresponding to 25% and 100% of the modules under test's power raiting were measured in a test configuration approximating the design for DC power distribution.  The measurements allow us to downselect to a prefered module and a full field test is under design.

AdvLIGO Administrative:

• Presentation on documentation for electronics in AdvLIGO using the new docDB system.   Introduced serial number and E-traveler concept. This is a work in progress.

---

For additional information about this report, contact Albert Lazzarini