News archive

The European Research Council (ERC) is funding our project GRAVITHELIUM to develop a key technology for the Einstein Telescope, the next-generation European gravitational-wave detector.

In February, our small team contributing to the Einstein Telescope actively participated in a working meeting with our colleagues from KAGRA, the Japanese Kamioka Gravitational Wave Detector.

This included an exploration of its spectacular installations deep under the mountains of the Kamioka mine in Kamioka-cho, Hida-city, Gifu-prefecture.

Our research for technological solutions for the Einstein Telescope is now featured in the “lookKIT” magazine (issue 2023/4).

It includes exceptional portraits like the one above and interviews of our three personnel committed to the project.

We presented the status of KIT’s R&D activities for the Einstein Telescope at the III. CNRS Helmholtz Dark Matter Lab (DMLab) meeting in November 2023 at KIT.

Since October 1, Ms. Sheila Rauch supports our team at the office. She is your contact in all administrative aspects and will be glad to help you. We are looking forward to a pleasant teamwork and wish Sheila Rauch a good start in her new position.

We presented major advancements of our new current lead development for superconducting applications at the European Conference on Applied Superconductivity EUCAS in September 2023 in Bologna.

In August, two of our group’s PhD students visited the ETpathfinder facility in Maastricht, Netherlands and met with collaborators in the Einstein Telescope (ET) project.

The large installation - parts of which can be seen in the above photo -  will act as a cryogenic testbed for interferometric gravitational-wave detectors.

From July 9 to 13, three of our research associates attended the biennial CEC/ICMC conference in Honolulu, Hawaii, USA. This was a great opportunity to engage in the international community of cryogenic researchers, join discussions about the latest technology, present our own research and, of course, bring back some Aloha!

On July 5, our yearly excursion to the MiRO took place in the frame of the ‚Industrial Gases Processing Course' (Refrigeration B). Our students got a great insight into the work life of process engineers in the largest refinery in Germany, discussing also the challenges and prospects of the energy change for the industry.

The public event “Effektvoll am KIT: Tag der offenen Tür 2023” took place on the 17th of June at KIT Campus North and welcomed around 25000 visitors. Our exhibition “Build your own Einstein Telescope” was again part of a public event and we enjoyed sparking the interest of a wide audience including kids, curious adults and scientists in this futuristic project we are part of.

In the end of May 2023, both the Gravitational Wave Advanced Detector Workshop 2023 and the ISB Vacuum & Cryogenics Divisional Meeting took place in Elba. Also in this occasion, we provided our contributions to the challenges of the Einstein Telescope.

The XIII symposium of the Einstein Telescope took place in Cagliari, Sardinia in May 2023.

We kept up our frequent contributions to this monumental project with talks and posters for the >200 participants.

In January 2023, we had the pleasure to attend the 10th ITEP Young Scientist Seminar in Kristberg, Austria. The seminar, focused on superconductors and their applications brought together the community of researchers engaged in superconductivity at KIT in fruitful scientific discussions.

One of the 3 km-long arms of the gravitational wave detector Virgo in Cascina near Pisa. Here, the Einstein Telescope Annual Meeting, held on the 15-17th of November 2022, gathered our community to further drive the realization of the Einstein Telescope.

We contributed our latest findings to the 2022 workshop of the Einstein Telescope’s Instrument Science Board.
It was held at the Gran Sasso Science Institute in L'Aquila with organizational support from INFN's National Laboratories of Gran Sasso.

In September 2022, we attended the GWDVac’22 Workshop in La Biodola Bay, Elba Island in Italy, where the main challenges of vacuum and cryogenics required for the 3rd generation of Gravitational Wave Detectors (GWD) were presented, followed by stimulating scientific discussions presenting possible solutions and future R&D requirements.

The CryoCourse 2022, the European intensive course on advanced Cryophysics and Cryogenics organised by Heidelberg University, takes place between September 9 and September 21, 2022. The course consists of a theoretical part and hands-on-courses and will cover the main topics of Cryogenics, from the fundamental physics concepts to industrial applications.

Thanks to everyone who stopped by at our exhibition “Build your own Einstein Telescope”  during the free public event “Code des Universums” in Karlsruhe on July 30, 2022. We had a great time introducing all of you to the game-changing Einstein Telescope-project that we are part of!

Snapshot of the simple Michelson interferometer model that was part of our exhibition during the public event “Code des Universums”. Kids and/or adults young-at-heart were invited to re-construct it on their own, as well.

In July 2022, the European thermodynamics community has met in Graz, where we have presented our latest phase equilibria data of cryogenic fluids.

Collaboration visit to Sapienza Università di Roma of our two PhD-students working on the Einstein Telescope in June 2022. 

Co-chairs of the Vacuum & Cryogenics Division in the ET Instrument Science Board: Jointly fighting entropy.

The Einstein Telescope is taking shape. Formal foundation of the ET Collaboration in Budapest on June 7, 2022.

Presentation of cryogenic technology potentials at the JENAS 2022 Symposium in Madrid, a prestigious joint meeting of particle, nuclear and astroparticle physics scientific communities.

TTK-KKT

In April 2022, we met with some of our Einstein Telescope project partners at the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) in Rome. The fruitful collaboration meeting was focused on the cryostat design for the Einstein Telescope’s low-frequency interferometer.