Capturing the Ripples of Spacetime: Exciting Space Project Continues
At the end of January 2024, the ESA (European Space Agency) Science Program Committee approved the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) mission. LISA is the first scientific project to detect and study gravitational waves from space.
For PI, this is yet another involvement in an exciting space research project. The LISA project goes back a long way. More than 10 years ago, three M-824 hexapods were used to build subsystems for the LISA Pathfinder mission, a technology demonstrator. Then in August last year, following the successful testing of a loan system, an H-824.G2 standard hexapod was initially ordered for the project. A further four H-824.G2 standard hexapods were then ordered in October 2023 by the companies involved in this project.
Our hexapods are mounted upside down at the end of a robot arm. This assembly is used to align and mount the numerous optical components required for the interferometer. After assembly, the completed optics board is launched into space as part of the mission. Image credit UK ATC
Confirmation that the main mission will go ahead will give us the opportunity to supply more hexapods to the groups involved.
How do we go beyond Einstein's theory of general relativity (his theory of gravity)? How do we probe the nature of space-time? How do we understand the most violent collisions in the Universe, between supermassive black holes? So, you bring together what is almost science fiction and the science engineering, and we make it a science reality.
This is how ESA Science Director, Prof. Carole Mundell, describes the tasks and objectives of this incredible and unique experiment in an interview with the BBC.
For further information see the following BBC article European mission approved to detect cosmic ripples. You can also find a post about this on LinkedIn.
Contact person: Kevin Grimley Project Manager PI UK