The National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN) and the German Center for Astrophysics (DZA) have signed a letter of intent to initiate a collaboration aimed at strengthening research and technological development activities for the Einstein Telescope (ET) project. The agreement was signed on Friday, December 6, at the INFN headquarters in Rome, by the President of INFN, Antonio Zoccoli, and the designated founding director of DZA, Günther Hasinger.
The goal of ET is to build, in the coming years, a large underground research infrastructure in Europe that will host the future third-generation gravitational wave detector. Due to the opportunities it offers in terms of both new scientific knowledge and technological innovation, it is considered a flagship project at the international level, to the point of being included in the 2021 Roadmap of ESFRI (European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures), the European body that provides advice on which crucial scientific infrastructure investments should be made in Europe.
With this perspective, INFN and DZA aim to fully commit to future cooperation, with the goal of making a significant contribution to the many scientific and technological research challenges that a project like ET will pose to the scientific community in the coming years.
More specifically, the collaboration between the two institutions will focus on the characterization of the candidate site of Sos Enattos, in Sardinia, and the German site in Lusatia, whose candidacy to host ET was recently proposed to the scientific community. Additionally, the agreement provides for the implementation of joint research and development projects, particularly in the design phase of the experiment, during which both detector configuration hypotheses will be studied: one involving the construction of two “L-shaped” instruments in Sardinia and Lusatia, and another involving a single triangular-shaped detector in one of the two regions.
Finally, the two institutions will promote the exchange of researchers between the two countries and will organize joint seminars and workshops, as well as invite other European institutes to join the cooperation agreement.