Detection of high-frequency gravitational waves using SRF cavities
Abstract
Today, apart from some isolated R&D efforts, there are no gravitational wave (GW) experiments, yet which explore a large part of the vast frequency range above the LIGO/Virgo band. It is planned to establish an experiment at Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) and at the Superconducting Quantum Materials and Systems (SQMS) Center at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) to search for high-frequency GWs in the frequency range of 10 kHz to 100 MHz. The basic idea is to use superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavities to detect tiny harmonic deformations induced by GWs which change the boundary conditions of the oscillating electromagnetic field. This paper summarizes the challenging environmental boundary requirements, and the R&D to operate a cavity using a low level RF (LLRF) system which pushes beyond state-of-the-art accuracy and resolutions and a seismic noise mitigated cryostat at 1.8 K. The focus of this paper is the warm and cold commissioning of a prototype cavity, built 20 years ago during the MAGO collaboration, and its first measurement in our collaborative research project.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2601.18719,
title = {Detection of high-frequency gravitational waves using SRF cavities},
author = {M. Wenskat and B. Giaccone and J. Branlard and V. Chouhan and C. Dokuyucu and L. Fischer and I. Gonin and A. Grassellino and W. Hillert and T. Khabiboulline and T. Krokotsch and F. Ludwig and G. Marconato and A. Melnychuk and G. Moortgat-Pick and A. Muhs and A. Netepenko and Y. Orlov and M. Paulsen and K. Peters and L. Pfeiffer and S. Posen and O. Pronitchev and H. Schlarb},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2601.18719},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
22nd Intl Conference on RF Superconductivity SRF 2025