LISA reaches a crucial milestone

The future gravitational-wave observatory in space completes a rigorous review

© NASA/JPL-Caltech/NASAEA/ESA/CXC/STScl/GSFCSVS/S.Barke (CC BY 4.0)

LISA Pathfinder - A Space Saga

Relive the groundbreaking technology demonstrator's mission milestones 5 years ago in a new Youtube mini-series released by the LISA Consortium.

LISA Pathfinder being encapsulated within the Vega rocket. © ESA–Manuel Pedoussaut

13th LISA Symposium talks are online

Find out about the exciting future of gravitational wave astrophysics in space!

Artist's impression of a LISA spacecraft. © AEI/MM/exozet

ESA ministers commit to biggest ever budget

The significant boost in funding for ESA’s world-class and inspirational science programme will allow the first gravitational wave detector in space, LISA, to fly alongside the black hole mission Athena.

ESA’s Council at Ministerial Level, Space19+, has concluded in Seville, Spain, with the endorsement of the most ambitious plan to date for the future of ESA and the whole European space sector. Image: ESA

Why we need a gravitational wave observatory in space

The science case for LISA

Merging Black Holes. Credit: T. Pyle/LIGO

The Gravitational Universe

Illuminating the dark universe with a new astronomy

Artist's impression of supermassive black hole. Credit: ESA/NASA, AVO project, Paolo Padovani.

LISA: A New Astronomy

Laser Interferometer Space Antenna

Artist's impression of LISA satellite. Credit: AEI/MM/exozet
The LISA Mission Homepage

LISA - observing gravitational waves in space

LISA will be a large-scale space mission designed to detect one of the most elusive phenomena in astronomy - gravitational waves. With LISA we will be able to observe the entire universe directly with gravitational waves, learning about the formation of structure and galaxies, stellar evolution, the early universe, and the structure and nature of spacetime itself.

The LISA Pathfinder Mission successfully paved the way for the LISA mission by demonstrating the key technologies for a large gravitational wave observatory in space. The results show that LISA Pathfinder is working to a precision better than required for LISA. The LISA Pathfinder mission was launched on 3rd December 2015 and ended in July 2017. 

The LISA Consortium

The LISA Consortium is committed to supporting the LISA mission. It includes all the main investigators involved in the highly successful LISA Pathfinder mission, a number of scientists who worked on the ground-based LIGO, Virgo, and GEO projects, and a number who worked on the Laser Ranging Interferometer on the GRACE Follow-On mission, thus making full use of the expertise accumulated so far. The LISA Consortium proposed and submitted the white paper The Gravitational Universe which was accepted for the ESA L3 slot.

If you are a scientist and wish to contribute to the LISA mission, use this scientist registration form.

A new frontier for exploring the physical universe

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Latest news and consortium activities

Date Title Summary
May 04, 2015
 LISA Pathfinder's scientific payload completely assembled The assembly of the LISA Pathfinder satellite is on track for the launch on top of a Vega...
Feb 11, 2016
 Gravitational waves observed for first time ever! LIGO Opens New Window on the Universe with Observation of Gravitational Waves from...
Apr 07, 2013
 Ready for launch: Heart of LISA Pathfinder space mission tested successfully The optical bench of the LISA Pathfinder (LPF) mission is currently being extensively...
Apr 09, 2021
 LISA Pathfinder - A Space Saga This series of short clips takes you back 5 years ago and lets you relive LISA Pathfinder...
Jun 25, 2013
 Latest LISA Pathfinder hardware delivery is 'Jewel in the Crown' A team of scientists from the University of Glasgow has successfully delivered a...

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Conferences, publications and positions

Date News topic Imagesort descending Title
Oct 12, 2016
 Papers Gravitational waves at interferometer scales and primordial black holes in axion inflation
Jun 17, 2024
 Conferences 27th Capra Meeting on Radiation Reaction in General Relativity, June 17-21 2024, Singapore
Nov 02, 2023
 Positions Faculty Positions in astronomy and gw-astronomy at Texas Tech Lubbock
May 03, 2010
 Papers Free fall and self-force: an historical perspective
Positions Positions in Quantum-Nanometrology within the QuantumFrontiers Excellence Cluster
Oct 11, 2023
 Positions Postdoctoral fellowship at the National University of Singapore
Nov 21, 2023
 Positions Postdoctoral position at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Jul 20, 2014
 Papers A fully relativistic radial fall
Feb 12, 2024
 Conferences Bottom-Up Cross-Cutting Workshop “JENAS Initiative: Gravitational Wave Probes of Fundamental Physics”, February 12-16 2024, Rome
Oct 24, 2023
 Positions Scheduler for LISA instruments at Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics
Dec 01, 2023
 Positions PhD Studentships at the University of Birmingham
Nov 17, 2016
 Papers A Second Higgs Doublet in the Early Universe: Baryogenesis and Gravitational Waves
Sep 22, 2023
 Positions Postdoctoral positions in Gravitational-Wave Physics and Astrophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Potsdam
Nov 07, 2023
 Positions Assistant Professor in Time-Domain Astronomy at University of Florida
May 11, 2000
 Papers Fast and Accurate Computation Tools for Gravitational Waveforms from Binary Systems with any Orbital Eccentricity

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