Jaime Alvarez
MIT Department: Physics
Faculty Mentor: Prof. Nergis Mavalvala
Research Supervisor: Eric Oelker
Undergraduate Institution: Fullerton College
Hometown: La Habra, California
Website: LinkedIn
Biography
Jaime Alvarez is a rising junior majoring in Physics at Fullerton College, now transferring to the University of California, Berkeley. He hopes to obtain a PhD in Physics and pursue an academic career. At the University of Southern California, he worked with Dr. Kris Pardo, using astrometric techniques to explore properties of gravitational waves, focusing on the chirp mass and distance of supermassive black hole binaries. At MIT, Jaime worked with Dr. Nergis Mavalvala and Dr. Eric Oelker in the LIGO lab on the GRAVITES project, which aims to explore the intersection between general relativity and quantum mechanics. His contributions include building a servo board for laser stabilization and assembling a high vacuum chamber for optical noise reduction. As he continues his academic journey at Berkeley, Jaime hopes to inspire others to pursue their curiosity and achieve great things, regardless of their circumstances.
Abstract
GRAVITES Noise Reduction
Jaime Alvarez1, Eric Oelker2 and Nergis Mavalvala2
1Department of Physics, Fullerton College
2Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
One major difficulty in modern physics is combining general relativity and quantum mechanics; limited progress in this area is partly due to the severe lack of experimental data. The GRAVITES experiment involves using a single-photon source to send photons through a Mach-Zehnder interferometer, with each interferometer path at different heights above the ground to observe gravitational effects on the photon’s interference pattern. In this work, we focused on reducing noise in the experiment by building, testing, and characterizing a servo board for the pre-stabilization laser and assembling the high vacuum and thermal isolation chamber. The servo board is necessary to detect and correct fluctuations in the laser’s frequency while the vacuum and isolation chamber attenuate the optical fiber noise. To characterize the servo board, we measured its noise spectrum using a high-precision spectrum analyzer. Our measurements revealed a noise level of approximately 10-7 Vrms/√Hz at 100 mHz, which is below the anticipated shot noise level of our photodetector. This experiment is one of the first to test the interaction between quantum mechanics and general relativity, serving as a basis for future experiments and potentially providing hints of new physics beyond what is currently known.
