Gravitational Waves: Present Status and Future Prospectus

Abstract

Remarkable progress has been made during recent years on the development of gravitational wave detectors. The review describes the present status and future prospectus of the gravitational wave astronomy. The main theme is to review the prominent long baseline detectors in operation around the world and proposed baseline and space-borne interferometers. Looking to the future, the major upgrades to the ground based detectors and new planned detectors will be completed over the coming years, which will create a network of detectors with the significantly improved sensitivity required to detect gravitational waves. Beyond this, the concept and design of possible future “third generation” gravitational-wave detectors will be discussed. Sources such as coalescing compact binary systems, neutron stars in low-mass X-ray binaries, stellar collapses and pulsars are all possible candidates for detection.