GWIC | Roadmap 2021

The direct observation of gravitational waves from a binary black hole merger in 2015 by LIGO and Virgo ushered in the era of gravitational-wave astronomy and has been heralded as a watershed moment in science. Motivated by the rapid growth and evolution of the field in the last five years, GWIC commissioned an update of the 2010 GWIC Roadmap.

Like its 2010 predecessor, the goal of the 2021 GWIC Roadmap is to serve the international gravitational wave community and its stakeholders as a tool for the development of capabilities and facilities needed to address the exciting scientific opportunities on the intermediate and long-term horizons. The updated roadmap assesses future developments in ground-based, space-based, and pulsar timing array gravitational-wave detectors, surveys the potential for growth in bandwidth and sensitivity of future gravitational-wave detectors, and highlights the science results anticipated to come from these new instruments.

Image: LIGO/Caltech/MIT/Sonoma State (Aurore Simonnet). Cover design: Charlotte Gurr, Springer Nature Limited.

GWIC Roadmap 2021 Committee

M. Bailes, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia
B. K. Berger, Stanford University, USA
P. R. Brady, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA
M. Branchesi, Gran Sasso Science Institute, INFN, Italy
K. Danzmann, Leibnitz Universität Hannover; Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (AEI), Germany
M. Evans, LIGO, MIT, USA
K. Holley-Bockelmann, Vanderbilt University; Fisk University, USA
B. R. Iyer, International Centre for Theoretical Sciences, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, India
T. Kajita, Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, University of Tokyo
S. Katsanevas, European Gravitational Observatory (EGO), Italy
M. Kramer, Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Bonn, Germany; Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, University of Manchester, UK
A. Lazzarini, LIGO, Caltech, USA
L. Lehner, Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, Canada
G. Losurdo, INFN Sezione di Pisa, Italy
H. Lück, Leibnitz Universität Hannover; Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (AEI), Germany
D. E. McClelland, OzGrav, Australian National University, Australia
M. A. McLaughlin, West Virginia University, USA
M. Punturo, INFN Sezione di Perugia, Italy
S. Ransom, NRAO, USA
S. Raychaudhury, Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), India
D. H. Reitze, LIGO, Caltech; University of Florida-Gainesville, USA
F. Ricci, University of Rome "La Sapienza"; INFN Sezione di Roma, Italy
S. Rowan, University of Glasgow, UK
Y. Saito, University of Tokyo; KEK, Japan
G. H. Sanders, Caltech, USA
B. S. Sathyaprakash, The Pennsylvania State University, USA; Cardiff University, UK
B. F. Schutz, Cardiff University, UK
A. Sesana, Universita degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca, Italy
H. Shinkai, Osaka Institute of Technology, Japan
X. Siemens, Oregon State University, USA
D. H. Shoemaker, LIGO, MIT, USA
J. Thorpe, NASA/GSFC, USA
J. F. J. van den Brand, Nikhef, Netherlands
S. Vitale, University of Trento, INFN, Italy