Rotational sensitivity of the "G-Pisa" gyrolaser

Abstract

G-Pisa is an experiment investigating the possibility to operate a high sensitivity laser gyroscope with area less than $1{\mathrm{m}}^2$ for improving the performances of the mirrors suspensions of the gravitational wave antenna Virgo. The experimental set-up consists in a He-Ne ring laser with a 4 mirrors square cavity. The laser is pumped by an RF discharge where the RF oscillator includes the laser plasma in order to reach a better stability. The contrast of the Sagnac fringes is typically above 50% and a stable regime has been reached with the laser operating both single mode or multimode. The effect of hydrogen contamination on the laser was also checked. A low-frequency sensitivity, below $1\mathrm{Hz}$, in the range of $10^{-8}(rad/s)/\sqrt{\mathrm{Hz}}$ has been measured.

6 pages, 6 figures, presented at the EFTF-IFCS joint conference 2009