For most of us, the mention of “technological innovation” brings to mind images of the technologies that have become useful for our everyday lives. We imagine aspiring app developers lounging about ...

Common to optical metrology in many modern systems, the Fizeau design uses a fixed, on-axis coherent point source to illuminate the interferometric cavity. For the most part, it works very well. While ...

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Scientists are building giant space lasers to unlock the secrets of ripples in spacetime. The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will comprise a trio of spacecraft flying in a vast triangular ...

Around 1.8 billion years ago, in a distant galaxy, two vast black holes spiraled into each other, and their cataclysmic merger sent ripples through the very fabric of the universe. On August 14, 2017, ...

Gravitational-wave detection technology is poised to make a big leap forward thanks to an instrumentation advance led by physicist Jonathan Richardson of the University of California, Riverside. A ...

Exail, the France-headquartered photonics company, says it has won a contract with the French Space Agency (CNES) to develop and deliver an “ultra-stable” laser system for the planned Laser ...

Artist Impression of LISA, the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna. Credit: NASA Ever since the telescope was invented in 1608, astronomers have striven for bigger and better telescopes. When it comes ...

6-axis nanopositioning system assembly provides the ultra high precision required to mount and align optical components to be launched into space, new from PI. Image Credit: PI (Physik Instrumente) LP ...

Stay calm, everybody stay calm. But it’s finally happening: The European Space Agency is committing itself to the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), a gravitational wave observatory that will ...

Orbital observatories such as the Hubble Space Telescope and James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can see far back into the universe—so far, in fact, that they have revealed some of the earliest galaxies ...