Progress of the TianQin project
Jun Luo, Shaojun Bai, Yanzheng Bai, Lin Cai, Hao Dang, Qijia Dong, Hui‐Zong Duan, Yuanbo Du, Fan Lei, X. Fu, Yong Qiang Gao, Xingyu Gou, Defeng Gu, Changlei Guo, Wei Hong, Bin Hu, H. Hu, Ming Hu, Yi-Ming Hu, Fa Peng Huang, Xin Ji, Yuan‐Ze Jiang, En-Kun Li, Hongyin Li, Ming Li, Ming Li, Yongping Li, Zhu Li, Zizheng Li, Junxiang Lian, Yurong Liang, Xudong Lin, Jianping Liu, Linxia Liu, Kui Liu, Li Liu, Minghe Liu, Qi Liu, Yanchong Liu, Yue Liu, Z. H. Lu, Pengshun Luo, Yingxin Luo, Yiqiu Ma, Yun Ma, Yunhe Meng, V. K. Milyukov, Peng Jian-guo, К. А. Постнов, Shaobo Qu, Tilei Shan, Cheng-Gang Shao, Changfu Shi, Peiyi Song, Yunfei Song, Wei Su, D. Tan, Shuping Tan, Yu-Jie Tan, Wen-Hai Tan, Yelong Tong, Liangcheng Tu, Chengrui Wang, Guoyong Wang, Lijiao Wang, Pan-Pan Wang, Shun Wang, Xiaoyong Wang, Xudong Wang, Yan Wang, Ran Wei, Shuchao Wu, Jie Xu, Zhilin Xu, Chao Xue, Hao Yan, Yong Yan, Changpeng Yang, Shan-Qing Yang, Hsien‐Chi Yeh, Zhaoxiang Yi, Hang Yin, Jianbo Yu, Wenhao Yuan, Butian Zhang, Dexuan Zhang, Jian-dong Zhang, Jie Zhang, Lihua Zhang, Xuefeng Zhang, Guoying Zhao, Liqian Zhao, Xin Zhao, An-Nan Zhou, Hao Zhou, Peng Zhou, Yupeng Zhou, Zebing Zhou, Fan Zhu, Liang-Gui Zhu
Abstract
Abstract TianQin is a future space-based gravitational wave (GW) observatory targeting the frequency window of 10 −4 –1 Hz. A large variety of GW sources are expected in this frequency band, including the merger of massive black hole binaries, the inspiral of extreme/intermediate mass ratio systems, stellar-mass black hole binaries, Galactic compact binaries, and so on. TianQin will consist of three Earth orbiting satellites on nearly identical orbits with orbital radii of about 10 5 km. The satellites will form a normal triangle constellation whose plane is nearly perpendicular to the ecliptic plane. The TianQin project has been progressing smoothly following the ‘0123’ technology roadmap. In step ‘0’, the TianQin laser ranging station has been constructed and it has successfully ranged to all the five retro-reflectors on the Moon. In step ‘1’, the drag-free control technology has been tested and demonstrated using the TianQin-1 satellite. In step ‘2’, the inter-satellite laser interferometry technology will be tested using the pair of TianQin-2 satellites. The TianQin-2 mission has been officially approved and the satellites will be launched around 2026. In step ‘3’, i.e. the TianQin-3 mission, three identical satellites will be launched around 2035 to form the space-based GW detector, TianQin, and to start GW detection in space.