The Einstein telescope ET, the first third-generation gravitational wave observatory, has reached a milestone: the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) has decided to include it in the updated version of its Roadmap 2021. This confirms ET''s relevance for future research in Europe and gravitational wave research at global level. This success is also thanks to QuantumFrontiers'' Research Unit B5 Gravitational Wave Astronomy. Project leader Harald Lück and his team have worked intensively in recent years to bring the Einstein telescope onto the ESFRI roadmap and have developed crucial new technologies for it.
Scientists plan to use the underground Einstein Telescope to pick up signals emitted just after the Big Bang and to investigate the nature of black holes. Its design allows measurements that are at least ten times more accurate in its measurements than current detectors. This will enable it to explore an area of the universe a thousand times larger in search of gravitational waves, and to detect sources too weak for the current generation of instruments.
For the first time, researchers will be able to study the precise structure of neutron stars, the birth of black holes and the structure of the universe immediately after the Big Bang. Using their findings, physicists want to test Einstein’s theory of relativity as never before and gain new insights into our cosmos.
Research institutions from ten European countries are working together in the ET consortium. In Germany alone, 17 universities and research institutes are participating, including the TU Braunschweig, the Leibniz University and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt. It is coordinated by the Dutch National Institute for Subatomic Physics NIKHEF and the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics INFN.
Further information on the webpages of the Einstein Telescope and the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics.
