Pulsar Gravity-Wave Data Search Einstein at Home written by Jamaal Johnson aka Jjohn

8/8/2019 Pulsar Gravity-Wave Data Search Einstein at Home written by Jamaal Johnson aka Jjohn

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PULSAR GRAVITY-WAVE DATA SEARCH at SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY:

EINSTEIN@HOME

____________________

A THESIS

Presented to the

Honors College at Southern University

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

____________________

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the

Honors College Degree

____________________

By

Jamaal N. Johnson

May 2006


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Honors College

Southern University


CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL

____________________

HONORS THESIS

____________________

This is to certify that the Honors Thesis of

Jamaal N. Johnson

has been approved by the examining committee for the thesis requirement for theHonors College degree in Computer Science.

___________________________________

Advisor

___________________________________Chairman, Honors Advisory Committee

___________________________________

Dean, Honors College


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ACKNOWLEGEMENT OF RESEARCH

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation Grant

No. PHY-0101177.


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PULSAR GRAVITY-WAVE DATA SEARCH at SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY:

EINSTEIN@HOME

____________________

An Abstract of a Thesis

Presented to the

Honors College at Southern University


____________________

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the

Honors College Degree

____________________

By

Jamaal N. Johnson

May 2006


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ABSTRACT

And God said Let there Be Light and it was so. However, before light there

were large bodies of Masses created and science suggests that the creation of these

landforms emitted gravitational radiation. According to Einsteins General Theory of

Relativity, gravity waves do in fact exist but as of date they have not been detected.

The LIGO research project has implemented three interferometers with the

capability to detect a gravitational wave, should one exist. With the implementation of

these interferometers and the constant tweaking of the instruments components, the

LIGO project has had and will have a profound impact on the world of science. This

impact will occur whether a gravity-wave signal is ever detected or not. This holds true

not only because of the improvements it has made in science but also on the view on

science as we know it. If a wave is not detected, then this will cause scientists to go back

hundreds of years and research the validity of many scientific principles that are being

taught in curriculums around the world.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost I would like to give reverence and thanks to my personal Lord

and Savior Jesus Christ for giving me strength, a sound mind, and the thirst for

knowledge to complete my years of study. I want to also thank him for blessing me with

a loving mother who was strong and who instilled principles of research and learning

inside of me at a young age. I love you MOM and I want to thank you for always taking

care of and loving hard for your children. You have done an excellent Job. I want to also

thank my Father for providing me with a home environment suitable for obtaining a good

education. You have always worked hard to provide for us and I will always remember

that. You helped me to become the man I am and I want to thank you for that. Also,

thanks Torie and Brittany, my two loving sisters who will do anything that they can for

me. I love you both dearly.

Next, I want to thank my Dear Aunt Beulah J. Clark. My Aunt Beulah has been

my mentor from the moment I moved to Baton Rouge, LA at the age of 12. There is

nothing I have asked of her that she hasnt done for me. Thanks so much Auntie. You

are wonderful!

Next, I want to thank the Honors College for your assistance in obtaining my

degree. Your funding and guidance have allowed me to focus on my books and get a

jump start on understanding what I was in college to do. I want to also thank the

Department of Computer Science. I prefer to call it the Family of Computer Science

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because I feel you all truly care about your students and I feel that I can come talk to

anyone of you about anything. Especially Mrs. Betz, Mrs. Roquemore, Mrs. Johnson,

and Mrs. Ricard. I love you all.

Last but certainly not least, I want to thank my advisor Dr. McGuire. You helped

to open up my mind in areas of Science that I never knew existed. You are a very

knowledgeable person and I truly appreciate the knowledge that you have allowed me to

obtain through this project. Thanks.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

ABSTRACT.v

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSvi

LIST OF APPENDICES..x

LIST OF FIGURES....xi

CHAPTER

I. BACKGROUND OF STUDY...........1

Introduction.. 1

Overview of LIGO: Purpose of Study 2

Significance of Study3

II. LITERATURE REVIEW..6

High Sensitivity Accelerators for Gravity Experiments6The Computational and Storage Potential of Vol. Computing..7

High Performance Task Distribution for Volunteer Computing...8BOINC..9

III. METHODS AND MATERIALS/METHODOLOGY.10

Einstein@Home Begins...10

Implementation of the Software...12

What Are Pulsars..13

The LIGO Screensaver.14

IV DATA.. 16

Search For Data16

Pulsar Gravity Radiation..17

Southern Universitys Search Credit...18

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V. CONCLUSION/SUMMARY..................................................................20

BIBLIOGRAPHY..............................................................................................................22

APPENDIX 1.....................................................................................................................26

APPENDIX 2.....................................................................................................................29

APPROVAL FOR SCHOLARLY DISSEMINATION....................................................30

VITA31

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LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix Page

1. An Interview With Dr. Stephen C. McGuire 26

2. Interferometer Diagram 29

x


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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

1. SETI Dish Radio Telescope.... 102. Order Phase of Two Neutron Stars Colliding. 11

3. Jocelyn Bell and Pulsar Signals.. 13

4. Diagram of A Pulsar14

5. Einstein@Home Screensaver..156. Rotating Pulsar18

7. Southern Universitys Cobblestone Credits19

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Pulsar Gravity-Wave Data Search at Southern University: Einstein @Home

Chapter 1Background of Study

Introduction

Albert Einstein was one of the greatest scientific minds in world history. Einstein

is known as a brilliant physicist who contributed more to the scientific world than any

other person. His theories on relativity paved the way for how science currently views

time, space, energy, and gravity. Einstein was so advanced in his thinking that his studies

and work set the standards for the control of scientific energy and space explorations

currently being studied in the field of astrophysics.

Albert Einstein predicted the existence of gravitational waves in 1916 as part of

the gravitational theory of general relativity. However, it is only now through The Laser

Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO), that this investigation has begun

to take place. As an experiment, LIGO seeks to make the first direct detections of the

elusive gravity waves predicted by Einstein.

According to the general theory of relativity, space and time are two different

aspects of reality in which matter and energy are ultimately the same. Space time can be

thought of as a fabric defined by the measuring of distances by rulers and the

measuring of time by clocks. The presence of large amounts of mass or energy distorts

this fabric and causes it to warp. This warpage of space-time is called gravity. Freely


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falling objects (satellites, soccer balls, beams of starlight) simply follow the most direct

path in this curved space-time.

Overview of LIGO: Purpose of Study

So, what exactly is LIGO? Well, as indicated above, the acronym itself stands for

Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory. However, the project itself is a

great deal more complex. The LIGO project deals with the detection of astrophysical

sources of Gravitational Waves. There are four types of events that would emit these

waves: The collision of extremely dense objects such as neutron stars and black holes;

the violent explosion and collapse of stellar systems via supernovae; pulsars which are

currently being searched for in the Einstein@Home Project; and gravity-wave remnants

of the event that scientists believed started the physical universe (1).

When large masses move suddenly, some of this space-time curvature propagates

outward, very similar to ripples of a pond struck by a rock. So we can take a closer look

at the neutron star theory. A neutron star is the burned out core often left behind after a

star explodes. It is very dense and can carry as much mass as the sun. Yet, it is only

about a two or three mile diameter sphere. When two objects this dense orbit each other,

space-time is stirred and gravitational energy ripples throughout the universe.

In order to detect these ripples, scientists must have the techniques and the

technologies to do so. This capability is managed in LIGO. The first detectors designed

to detect gravity-waves were built in the 1960s by J. Weber of the University of

Maryland (2). A second generation gravity-wave detector, the LIGO interferometer, will


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detect the ripples through the universe using a device called a laser interferometer. The

Interferometer measures the time it takes for light to travel between suspended mirrors by

using controlled laser light (see appendix 2). Two mirrors hanging a far distance from

each other make up one arm of the interferometer and a perpendicular make up forms the

other arm. The shape of the interferometer is an L. Laser light enters the arms through

a beam splitter located at the corner of the L, dividing the light between the arms. The

light can bounce between the mirrors many times before it returns to the beam splitter. If

there is any difference between the lengths of the arms, some light will travel where it

can be recorded by a photo detector. The space-time ripples cause the distance measured

by a light beam to change as the gravitational wave passes by, and the amount of light

falling on the photo detector to vary. This distance is exceedingly small, 10-18m, so that

laser interferometry is needed in order to perform the measurement. The photo detector

then produces signals that define the variation of light falling on it over time. The laser

interferometer converts gravitational waves into electrical signals much like a

microphone converts sound waves into electrical signals. However, there is a catch.

There must be at least two widely separated detectors, operated in unison, to rule out

false signals and to confirm that a gravitational wave has in fact passed through Earth.

Thus, three interferometers of the same kind were built two near Richland, Washington,

and another near Baton Rouge, LA (see Appendix 2). The idea is that because these

gravity waves travel at a finite speed, 3.0 * 108m/s (speed of light), there is only a short


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amount of time allowed between an occurrence in one interferometer and a showing in

the other. This time frame is about 10 milliseconds.

Now one may ask: what else will these interferometers and photo detectors see.

Well, given their sensitivity to vibrations, they will pick up a variety of signals. These

signals may be anything from earth quakes to earth tides. So, with this in mind, how will

the LIGO detectors identify and differentiate these signals and those of gravitational

wave ripples caused by the crashing and merging of neutron stars? The following

paragraph will explain how.

Along with the development and implementation of the interferometers,

theoretical expressions have been calculated that describe the signal of a gravitational

wave caused by such astrophysical changes in mass distributions. With the density, size,

and speed of these neutron stars, specifications or detailed features of the event can be

theoretically predicted so as to produce the types of signals that we expect to see. To

even further distinguish these signals, they can be compared to supernova stars and

quasars which produce periodic wave signals. It is expected that the signals produced by

the gravitational wave ripples will in theory be much more a-periodic and irregular (3).

Significance of Study

In order to find such signals in gravitational wave data, a huge capacity of

computing power must be used. Estimates indicate that searching gravitational data

with the maximum possible sensitivity would require many times the computing capacity

of even the most powerful supercomputer. This is where the Einstein @ Home Project


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becomes a major player in the scope of the LIGO Project. Einstein @ Home searches

data from the three observatories for any type of signal that may come from dense,

rapidly rotating quark and neutron stars (4). According to Einsteins theory, if these stars

are not perfectly spherical, they should continuously emit gravitational waves (4). The

three observatories now contain enough sensitivity where they would detect signals if the

signals were close enough to earth.


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Chapter 2

Literature Review

The LIGO project is a very new project so the types of Literature wont be found

in the traditional places where one may be accustomed to researching information. Most

of the material that is out for research will be in the form of theses, scholarly journals,

and magazine articles.

High Sensitivity Accelerators for Gravity Experiments

This thesis paper was written by Alessandro Bertolini and it talks about the first

detection of a gravity wave signal as the main goal in this gravitational experiments;

more specifically the LIGO project. He tells how the LIGO project uses three large laser

interferometers to obtain data that could possibly be from gravitational waves and how

there are many research and development groups who are constantly working to improve

the components of the lasers, the antennas, the optical scheme, the quality of the mirror

and their suspension system. The proper functionality of all these components is

essential in order to properly detect a wave source from the explosion of pulsars.

This thesis is divided into seven chapters. Chapter one gives an introduction of

the gravitational wave principles and an overview of the possible sources where a

gravitational wave can be detected. In Chapter two, the LIGO interferometers are

reviewed. Here, he discusses about the principles of their operation, the components of

the interferometers, and their limitations to sensitivity. Chapter three describes the

Seismic Attenuation Systems attenuator design and operation. It is estimated that a

typical gravity wave event will shake masses a few kilometers apart by a distance of .

000000000000000001 meters or less. The aim of the earth based interferometers


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antennas is to detect this displacement in the frequency range of a few Hz and a few kHz.

This is so it can be distinguished from the low frequency fluctuations of the gravity field

of the Earths crust. This very important concept is discussed in chapter three. Chapters

four and five discuss the horizontal accelerometer. A horizontal accelerometer is able to

read accelerations which occur in a longitudinal direction. These chapters go into detail

about the design features, the physics of the instrument, the materials and machining

issues, the electronics of the accelerometer, the capacitance position sensor (determines

the position between two opposed electrodes), the feedback system and the noise feature.

In chapter six, preliminary applications of the accelerator are presented and in chapter

seven, a new tunneling displacement sensor is introduced (5).

The Computational and Storage Potential of Volunteer Computing

This is a paper submitted for publication by David P Anderson and Gilles Fedak

about the positive potential of a phrase they termed Volunteer Computing. It says that

Volunteer Computing uses internet-connected computers as a source for computing

power and storage. The computers are volunteered by their owners and they are used to

compute large quantities of data and information to an ongoing research project. The

paper studies the potential capacity of volunteer computing and during their research they

analyzed measurements of over 330,000 hosts participating in a volunteer computing

project. The measurements included processing power, memory, disk space, network

throughput, host availability, user specified limits on resource usage, and host churn.


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They show that volunteer computing can support applications that are significantly more

data intensive and have larger memory and storage requirements.

High Performance Task Distribution for Volunteer Computing

This is a paper written by David P. Anderson, Eric Korpela, and Rom Walton. It

discusses the task server power that is involved in Volunteer Computing (6). Volunteer

Computer projects use a task server to manage work. Participants PCs will periodically

communicate with the server to report completed tasks and to get new tasks. In the LIGO

project, tasks are basically bits of information that need to be inputted and analyzed. The

rate at which the server can dispatch tasks may limit the computing power available to

the project. This paper discusses the design of the task server in the Berkeley Open

Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC), which is the software used for volunteer

computing in the LIGO Project (see p. 12).

In this paper, they show measurements of the CPU time and the disk input and

output used by a BOINC server. They show that a server used by a single inexpensive

computer can distribute about 8.8 million tasks per day. With two additional computers,

this increases to 23.6 million tasks per day.

BOINC: A System for Public-Resource Computing and Storage.

LIGO uses the BOINC software for Volunteer Computing. David P Andersons

Paper on the BOINC software talks about how it makes it easy for scientist to create and

operate public-resource computing projects. It tells how the software supports diverse


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applications, including those that have large storage or communication requirements,

such as the LIGO project.

The BOINC software allows participants to be active in various BOINC projects

and it allows them to specify how their computer resources are allocated. The paper

describes the goals of BOINC, the design issues they confronted, and their solutions to

these problems.


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Chapter 3

Methods and Materials/Methodology

Einstein @ Home Begins

Einstein @ Home is a project developed to search for the gravitational waves

predicted by Einsteins Theory. It relies upon the donation of idle computer time from

potential users around the world. The Einstein @ Home project was made available to

the public on Saturday February 16, 2005 (7). It is a home based program that uses the

same basic platform as SETI @ Home (8), which had about 5 million users who shared

their computers to search for data that contained signs of extraterrestrial intelligence.

Figure 1 World's largest single dish radio telescope. Site where the SETI info is collected.

(www.myurl.net)

According to Einstein, the universe is full of gravitational waves. He suggested

that the movement of heavy objects (dense stars and black holes); create waves that

change space and time. This idea is shown in figure 2 below.


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Figure 2: Order phase of two neutron stars colliding (http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu).

Einstein @ home allows users to search through data from the LIGO

observatories that detect the possible emission of these waves. The program searches for

faint signals that could possibly be coming from dense rapidly rotating compact quark

stars and neutron stars which are very likely to emit continuous gravitational waves (9).
http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/


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The basic idea behind the software, which was in beta testing for a period of time, is to

download information from a central computer directly onto the hosts home CPU. The

data is then automatically analyzed while the persons computer is idle and then

uploaded directly back into the central computer. The data is chunked into 12-megabyte

pieces and it is analyzed three times by the software for a possible gravitational signal.

The signals that prove to be most intriguing are flagged and then sent to the project

scientists to be further analyzed.

Implementation of the Software

Implementation of the software is quite simple and anyone with a PC is able to do

it. The name of the software is BOINC and its acronym stands for: Berkley Open

Infrastructure for Networking Computing. There are many other projects similar to

Einstein @ Home which use this same software. Some of these projects include:

Climateprediction.net, which studies the change of climate in different areas; Predictor @

Home, which studies protein related diseases; Rosetta @ Home, which helps researches

find cures for human diseases; and SZTAKI Desktop Grid, which searches for

generalized binary number systems.

The first step in downloading the software is finding out which platform you will

be using. The BOINC software can be downloaded onto Mac, Windows, and Linux

operating systems. The Southern University Physics Department - LIGO IT uses the

Windows operating system for its contribution to the project. Once you have figured out

what platform you will be running the software on, you simply go to the Einstein@Home


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homepage (http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/), and follow the instructions under Join

Einstein@Home. As mentioned before, the main purpose of BOINC in the scope of

LIGO and Einstein@Home is to search for gravitational wave signals generated by

pulsars.

What are Pulsars?

Pulsars are what scientists believe to be the fastest-spinning stars in the universe.

They were first discovered by Anthony Hewish and Jocelyn Bell in 1967 (10). One

summer while Bell was pursuing her PhD, they observed an unusual wavelength signal at

3.7m on a radio telescope that was specifically designed to observe the twinkling

(scintillation) of stars.

Figure 3 Jocelyn Bell at the Cambridge site where the first Pulsar Signals were recorded.


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She found the reading to be regular every 1.3373011 seconds and it synchronized with

star time. Their discovery was the first known in existence and the pulsing signal became

known as Pulsars.

We now know that a pulsar is a neutron star that emits beams of radiation that

cover the earths line of site. Or at least we know this in theory. The pulses of this high

energy radiation come from a misalignment of the neutron stars rotation axis and its

magnetic axis. Pulsars give off a pulse because of the rotation of the neutron star causes

the radiation generated within the magnetic field to sweep in and out of our line of sight

with a regular period (11). An illustration of this concept is shown below in figure 4.

Figure 4 A diagram of a pulsar showing its rotation axis, its magnetic axis, and its magnetic field.

The LIGO Screensaver

The Einstein@Home Screensaver is a real time display that consists of many of

the elements related to the LIGO project. The screensaver primarily consists of a rotating

celestial sphere that contains the known constellations and the three geographic positions


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of the three gravity wave detectors involved in the project. The positions of the detectors

change over a period of one earth rotation and the change in position is relative to the

stars positions in space. A picture of the screensaver can be seen below in figure 5.

Figure 5 Einstein@Home Screensaver


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Chapter 4

Data

Search For Data

The whole purpose of the Einstein@Home LIGO experiment is to search for

signals matching that of a pulsar gravity wave. Once this is done, the project is a success

and the study can then continue on into other areas of exploration. However, there is one

problem with identifying that signal. With the LIGO detectors being as sensitive as they

are, the most sensitive made to date it is hard to distinguish a pulsar gravity wave

signal from signals that arise from many different sources. These sources include:

seismic ground motion, thermal vibrations of the atoms making up the detector and

suspensions, and the particle like quantum behavior of the laser light (12). The problem

of finding a pulsar signal amidst these other signals has been described as trying to hear a

flute in the middle of a heavy metal concert. All of the other signals can be considered

noise and the purpose of LIGO is to identify a known wave form among this noise of the

detector.

The method that LIGO will use to search for this data in noise is called matched

filtering or optimal filtering. It can be proven mathematically that this is the best

technique to search for a known signal that is mixed up in unwanted noise. This idea is

not very hard to comprehend. If the exact waveform of the signal is known, then it can

be multiplied times the output of the detector and averaged over a period of time called T.

The resulting integral will have two terms. One has an expected value which grows like

the square root of time T, coming from the random noise that comes from the detector.

This process is also known as the random walk process (13). The random walk process


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can be described as having a starting point, moving from one point in the path to the next

at a constant distance, and the direction from one point to the next is picked at random.

The other term from the matched filtering technique will grow in proportion to time T

and is due to the pulsar signal. Since T is limited to the amount of time that data is

actually collected, the pulsar signal must have a minimum signal strength to be detectable

in that finite amount of time (14).

Pulsar Gravity Radiation

So why would a pulsar emit gravity radiation? As stated before, Pulsars are the

fastest spinning stars in the universe and in almost all cases these stars are not perfect

spheres so as they spin, they continue to rip through space and emit waves of radiation.

According to News Office, in association with The Massachusetts institute of technology,

Gravitational radiation waves are ripples in the fabric of space which was predicted by

Albert Einstein in his Theory of Relativity.

In an article entitled Einsteins gravitational waves may set speed limit for pulsar

spin, an explanation was given as to why pulsars are capable of emitting gravitational

waves. Pulsars are defined as the core remains of exploded stars. They are so dense that

they contain the mass of the Earths sun yet they are only about 10 miles across. Imagine

this compared to the suns radius of about 432 163.664 miles. Pulsars are known to gain

speeds of about one revolution per millisecond or almost 20 percent that of the speed of

light which is about 299,792,458 meters per second (15). To get an understanding of

how astronomical these speeds are, a comparison of a pulsars rotation time with the


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earths. It takes the earth about 24 hours to make a full rotation. Compared to a pulsars

millisecond rotation, it is easily seen how fast these pulsars are spinning. Even though a

pulsar has a significantly shorter radius, it is about 333000 times denser than the earth.

With that said, scientists believe that the faster a pulsar spins, the more it will emit

gravity waves because of its constant deformation and warping (16)

Figure 6 Image by Dana Berry of a rotating pulsar. This image is displayed on web.mit.edu website.


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Southern Universitys Search Credit

As stated before, the goal of the BOINC software is to aid LIGO in the search for

gravitational waves. Because there is so much information to be processed, the more

people that are connected to LIGO through the BOINC software, the more likely we will

be able to detect a gravitational wave at a faster rate. As seen the figure below, Southern

University has received and processed 63,969 cobblestones of credit. A cobblestone is

1/100 day of CPU time on a BOINC computer. It received the name cobblestone after

Jeff Cobb of SETI@Home.

Figure 7 Southern University's Cobblestone Credits


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Chapter 5

Summary/Conclusion

Summary and Conclusions

This Honors College thesis comprises the first implementation of the LIGO

distributed data analysis program known as Einstein@home within the Southern

University System. Thus, a major outcome has been the initiation of Southern

Universitys contribution to the search for gravitational radiation produced by pulsar

astrophysical sources. At present the software is operating on several desktop computers

within the department of physics, which serves as the academic home of the Southern

University-LIGO Research Group, led by Dr. Stephen C. McGuire, Professor of Physics

and Department Chair. We can anticipate that as other departments become involved

with LIGO, they, too, will apply resources to the project and thereby increase our

contribution to the quest to detect gravity waves.

Further, the work of this thesis complements our pre-existing collaboration with

the LIGO Science Education Center (SEC) co-located with the Observatory in nearby

Livingston, Louisiana. In particular, the department of physics is revamping its physics

education courses to help better prepare middle and high school science teachers for the

future. As of this writing Southern University is further distinguished by being the only

Historically Black College/University (HBCU) that is a member of the LIGO Scientific

Collaboration (LSC), the body that recommends the research and development agenda for

the LIGO experiment.


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Because LIGO is pushing the limits of technology in making the measurement of

gravity waves a reality it is not unreasonable to expect that there will practical spin-offs

from this project in the future. One only has to look to modern day health care to see the

manifestations of basic physics research in our every day lives. Examples include

nuclear magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), diagnostic nuclear medicine based on the use

of radioisotopes, radiation therapy, laser surgery and arthroscopic surgery. These are just

a few examples where discoveries in basic science have led to major advances in

medicine. We also note that even as LIGO evolves as an experiment, improvements in

science and engineering are occurring. Examples include innovations in real-time data

acquisition and analysis hardware and software systems, advances in the production and

maintenance of high vacuum systems, operation of electromechanical systems, as well as

improvements in high laser power optical systems and vibration isolation engineering.

What will we learn about our universe from LIGO? What practical applications

will stem from LIGO, exactly? Well, well have to wait and see, but they probably will

be full of surprises. For future generations of students and faculty at Southern

University, a foundation has been laid for them to answer these questions by making their

contributions.


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Bibliography

1. McGuire, Dr. Stephen C. Personal interview. 11 Apr. 2006.

2. "Einstein@Home." University of Southern Indiana Department of Physics. 14 Mar.

2005 .

3. Bartusiak, Marcia. "Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory - an

Astronomical Tool of the 21st Century, a Detector Like No Other Before It."

Online Magazine of the Israel Physical Society 01 Jan. 2005. 20 Feb. 2006

.


2005 .

5. Berolini, Alessandro. High Sensitivity Accelerators for Gravity Experiments. Diss.

Universita di Pisa, 2001. .

6. David P. Anderson, Eric Korpela, Rom Walton, "High-Performance Task Distribution

for Volunteer Computing," e-science, pp. 196-203, First International Conference

on e-Science and Grid Computing (e-Science'05), 2005.

7. Boyle, Alan. "Software Sifts Through Gravity's Mysteries." MSNBC. 19 Feb. 2005

.

8. "SETI@Home." SETI@Home. University of California. 16 Feb. 2006


2005 .

10. Bell, Jocelyn. "Petit Four." Annals of New York Academy of Science 1977: 685-689.


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11. "Pulsars." NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. NASA. 15 May 2005

.

12. Gonzalez, Gabriela. Suspensions Thermal Noise in the LIGO Gravitational Wave

Detector. Diss. Pennsylvania State Univ., 2000. .

13. Weisstein, Eric W. "Random Walk-1-Dimensional." Math World. 05 Dec. 2005

.

14. Saulson, Peter. "10 Years in Gravitational Wave Detection." 09 July 2001. Syracuse

University. 06 Jan. 2006 .

15. "Pulsars." NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. NASA. 15 May 2005

.

16. "Einstein's Gravitational Waves May Set Speed Limit for Pulsar Spin." News Office.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 7 Apr. 2006

.


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Appendix 1. An interview with Dr. Stephen C. McGuire

Dr. Stephen C. McGuire is Professor and Chair of the department of physics atSouthern University and A&M College. His research interests are in the areas of

experimental materials physics and the integration of research with teaching and

learning. Dr. McGuire is the Principal Investigator and Director of the NationalScience Foundation (NSF)-funded project, Materials Science, Astronomy and

Educational Outreach. The project is a collaboration between Southern University at

Baton Rouge (SUBR) and the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory(LIGO). LIGO is a major NSF experiment designed to detect and measure gravity-

waves reaching earth from space and promises to create the entirely new field of

gravitational astronomy (See, for example, www.ligo.caltech.edu). Dr. McGuire is theSouthern University delegate to the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and leads the Southern

University LIGO Physics Group. He is the Honors Thesis advisor to Mr. Jamaal N.

Johnson, undergraduate computer science major.

1. JNJ To what other areas of science is LIGO contributing?

SCM -- As a forefront physics effort LIGO pushes the limits of bothastrophysics and the physics of the technology that is needed to perform the

experiment. It is in this second area that LIGO has made and continues to make

contributions to science and technology. Specific examples includeimprovements in high laser power optical systems, advances in the production and

maintenance of large volume, high vacuum systems, innovations in real-time

data acquisition and analysis hardware and software systems, operation of

electromechanical systems, as well as mechanical vibration isolation engineering.These spin off areas are a direct result of the need to bring online an instrument

that has never existed before in the history of mankind, the LIGO Observatory

2. JNJ - Can you comment on the stabilization of the instrumentation involvedin the LIGO experiment?

SCM -- If by stabilization you mean the ability to continuously operate the

interferometer in the mode in which science is being done, there has been great

progress in this area. The most significant improvement, however, has been the

implementation of an active vibration dampening system known as the HydraulicExternal Pre-Isolator, or HEPI, system. With the implementation of HEPI the

duty cycle for daytime operation, for example, when there noise levels from

human activity is the greatest, has improved significantly.
http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/


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3. JNJ - Please comment on the types of events that are expected to produce

signals in the interferometer. That is, what types of astrophysical events are

expected to be seen with LIGO?

25

SCM -- There are basically four types of astrophysical events that are predicted

to generate gravity waves that may be observable with LIGO. They include the

collision of extremely dense objects such as neutron stars and black holes, theviolent explosion and collapse of stellar systems via supernovae, pulsars such

as that being searched for in the Einstein@home project -- and gravity-wave

remnants of the event theorized to have started the physical universe, known as

the big bang. All involve rapid asymmetrical redistributions of astronomicalamounts of matter and therefore are thought to be big producers of gravitational

radiation.

4. JNJ - If gravity waves are conclusively not observed by LIGO what otherresearch directions might result from this finding?

SCM -- As an experiment, LIGO is part of the process of the scientific method

wherein a theory, the general theory of relativity in this case, is tested. The test,

for us, is the existence of gravity waves. There is much indirect evidence that thisphenomenon is real. We know that Newtons Universal Law of Gravitation

doesnt explain all of what we observe. Should it be determined that gravity

waves do not exist, then gravitational radiation theory and its interpretation will

be revisited by the scientific community. In either case, I believe it will be asignificant find for science and will surely help point us in the direction of a more

accurate view of our physical universe.

5. JNJ - Do you see LIGO contributing

in some way to the improvement of

healthcare through advances in diagnosis and/or treatment?

SCM -- On the one hand improvements in health care is not a goal of LIGO, it

would not be unusual for applications of the new knowledge gained to eventuallyfind applications in that field. Notable past examples of the practical

manifestation of pure science include nuclear magnetic resonance, or MRI as its

called, diagnostic nuclear medicine, radiation therapy, laser surgery, arthroscopicsurgery, etc. New knowledge almost always leads to some practical uses and as

your question suggests health care is an ongoing concern for our society. Well

just have to wait to see over time where the applications of the new materialsscience, laser physics, and computer technology will occur.


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6. JNJ -What type of results have been

obtained so far from the five scienceruns

that have taken place?

SCM Lots. You are referred to the LIGO web site for many examples of

papers and presentations that describe results from the approximately 500

researchers that work worldwide on the LIGO project. 'Happy surfing!26

APPENDIX 2.

Interferometer Diagram


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APPROVAL FOR SCHOLARLY DISSEMINATION

The author grants to the Honors College the right to reproduce, by appropriate

methods, upon request, any or all portions of this thesis.

It is understood that request consists of agreement, on the part of the requesting

party, that said reproduction is for his personal use and that subsequent reproduction will

not occur without the written approval of the author of the thesis.

The author of this thesis reserves the right to publish freely, in the literature, at

any time, any or all portions of this thesis.

Author______________________________

Date________________________________


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Pulsar Gravity-Wave Data Search Einstein at Home written by Jamaal Johnson aka Jjohn

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