Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2020
LISA Pathfinder (LPF) has been a space-based mission designed to test new technologies that will ... more LISA Pathfinder (LPF) has been a space-based mission designed to test new technologies that will be required for a gravitational wave observatory in space. Magnetically driven forces play a key role in the instrument sensitivity in the low-frequency regime (mHz and below), the measurement band of interest for a space-based observatory. The magnetic field can couple to the magnetic susceptibility and remanent magnetic moment from the test masses and disturb them from their geodesic movement. LPF carried on-board a dedicated magnetic measurement subsystem with noise levels of 10 $\rm nT \ Hz^{-1/2}$ from 1Â Hz down to 1 mHz. In this paper we report on the magnetic measurements throughout LPF operations. We characterize the magnetic environment within the spacecraft, study the time evolution of the magnetic field and its stability down to 20Â ÎĽHz, where we measure values around 200Â $\rm nT \ Hz^{-1/2}$, and identify two different frequency regimes, one related to the interplanetary magne...
We report on electrostatic measurements made on board the European Space Agency mission LISA Path... more We report on electrostatic measurements made on board the European Space Agency mission LISA Pathfinder. Detailed measurements of the charge-induced electrostatic forces exerted on free-falling test masses (TMs) inside the capacitive gravitational reference sensor are the first made in a relevant environment for a space-based gravitational wave detector. Employing a combination of charge control and electric-field compensation, we show that the level of charge-induced acceleration noise on a single TM can be maintained at a level close to 1.0  fm s^{-2} Hz^{-1/2} across the 0.1-100 mHz frequency band that is crucial to an observatory such as the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA). Using dedicated measurements that detect these effects in the differential acceleration between the two test masses, we resolve the stochastic nature of the TM charge buildup due to interplanetary cosmic rays and the TM charge-to-force coupling through stray electric fields in the sensor. All our me...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2020
LISA Pathfinder (LPF) has been a space-based mission designed to test new technologies that will ... more LISA Pathfinder (LPF) has been a space-based mission designed to test new technologies that will be required for a gravitational wave observatory in space. Magnetically driven forces play a key role in the instrument sensitivity in the low-frequency regime (mHz and below), the measurement band of interest for a space-based observatory. The magnetic field can couple to the magnetic susceptibility and remanent magnetic moment from the test masses and disturb them from their geodesic movement. LPF carried on-board a dedicated magnetic measurement subsystem with noise levels of 10 $\rm nT \ Hz^{-1/2}$ from 1Â Hz down to 1 mHz. In this paper we report on the magnetic measurements throughout LPF operations. We characterize the magnetic environment within the spacecraft, study the time evolution of the magnetic field and its stability down to 20Â ÎĽHz, where we measure values around 200Â $\rm nT \ Hz^{-1/2}$, and identify two different frequency regimes, one related to the interplanetary magne...
We report on electrostatic measurements made on board the European Space Agency mission LISA Path... more We report on electrostatic measurements made on board the European Space Agency mission LISA Pathfinder. Detailed measurements of the charge-induced electrostatic forces exerted on free-falling test masses (TMs) inside the capacitive gravitational reference sensor are the first made in a relevant environment for a space-based gravitational wave detector. Employing a combination of charge control and electric-field compensation, we show that the level of charge-induced acceleration noise on a single TM can be maintained at a level close to 1.0  fm s^{-2} Hz^{-1/2} across the 0.1-100 mHz frequency band that is crucial to an observatory such as the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA). Using dedicated measurements that detect these effects in the differential acceleration between the two test masses, we resolve the stochastic nature of the TM charge buildup due to interplanetary cosmic rays and the TM charge-to-force coupling through stray electric fields in the sensor. All our me...
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Papers by Gudrun Wanner