In view of the opening of the SR tower, I setup the automation in the following way:

• DET_MAIN in SHUTTER_CLOSED, then paused;
• SUS_SR in MISALIGNED, then paused;
• DRMI_LOCK in MISALIGNED_PR_SR, then paused;
• ITF_LOCK in DOWN, then paused;
• SUS_PR in MISALIGNED, then manual;
• OMC_LOCK in TEMP_CONTROLLED, then manual;
• INJ_MAIN in IMC_RESTORED, then manual;
• ARMS_LOCK in LOCKED_ARMS_IR, then manual;
• all other nodes unchanged.

As a consequence, the DMS and in general the webpages will not reflect the status of the interferometer anymore, as it is desumed from the state of ITF_LOCK.

For the following weeks, the nodes INJ_MAIN and ARMS_LOCK should be (almost) the only ones to be operated manually; they will not talk with one another, so people should take care of both:

• INJ_MAIN: unless the FmodErr tuning is really needed, IMC_RESTORED is the target state

• ARMS_LOCK: nothing above LOCKED_BEATING_BOOST_ON should be requested

The SR RH have been switched OFF at  17.31 UTC, in preparation for SR venting foreseen for tomorrow.

As a second step, the ETM RHs have been switched OFF for the measurement of arms astigmatism.

17.29 UTC NE RH OFF

17.30 UTC WE RH OFF

We had a look at tonight injections and compared them with those of the previous night

The examined periods are:

17000 s starting from Dec 11, 01:00 

17000 s starting from Dec 11, 22:20 

We used a spectra resolution of 2000s.

The first dataset is polluted by a 0.1 Hz spaced  comb, which is present in the Voltage and current monitors of the large coil amplifier as well as in the witness magnetometer (placed close to the WE tower).  We suspect this might be related to the injected lines being multiples of 0.1 Hz.  The problem with this is that Hrec itself is polluted by a 0.1 Hz comb, although it is not related with our injected noise. Infact, as shown in Figure 16 (example around the injected line 10.5Hz) the same 0.1 Hz comb was present also when not injecting (purple). 

Therefore, in the second set of injections we moved the lins frequencies at **.*77 Hz. This time we noticed a somehow larger spectral noise "floor" in the Voltage, Current monitors and magnetometers as well, which resembles a comb spaced by 0.77 Hz. However, this turns out to be better, because no such comb is present in Hrec a priori.

Going through the injected lines one by one (Figures 1 to 15), it looks that we have achieved a good measurement of CF at most of them. Missing ones for now are 3.6, 4.6, 5.7 Hz, which might be recovered improving the analysis.

We do not have a good explanation for the extra noise  produced by the amplifier, it seems related to a non linearity in the amplifier itself, since the spectrum of the injected noise (ENV_NOISE_MAG_WEB) does not show this features.

As agreed with Michal, I reduced the ETM RHs power by 50%, to allow arms astigmatism measurement.

13.06 UTC NE RH reduction to V = 11.7 V  (3.7 W)

13.07 UTC WE RH reduction to V = 12.3 V (4.07 W)

In 2024, Antonella Bianchi did also the power decomposition at the dark fringe for various input powers. The results are summarized in the wiki page:
https://wiki.virgo-gw.eu/Commissioning/OptChar/O4_param

In the section " TABLE FOR WHEN THE IFO IS 1h after CARM NULL STATE IS REACHED", the results are comparable to what Michal reported for the dark fringe (not identical but in the same range for most).

This morning we installed the Optris thermocamera on the HR face of the NI mirror, using the same support used for the infrared NI_cam (see Figs. 1, 2 and 3). We adjusted the image focus and connected it to the online streaming, accessible only via EGO Wifi, at the address : http://172.31.10.103:8080/

On Fig. 4 we can see the images of the thermocamera with the ITF locked. The last attachment is a video where we can see the appearance of the PAs while the lock acquisition takes place.

The phase camera data for an aligned phase camera confirms that most of the power on B1p in LN2 is due to the carrier.

Figure 1 shows data from phase camera power of sidebands and carrier and the total of all curves shown. Highlighted is time in single bounce when almost all the power is in the carrier light and in LN2 where most of the power (~80%) is in carrier light. Which is compatiable with the OMC scan measurements that 10% of the power is in the 56MHz TEM00 modes, with a few more percent in sideband higher order modes.

Figure 2 shows the ratio between the PC carrier and total, making it clearer that it is 80% of the power.

In April/May 2025 the EDB OMC was installed, this has misaligned the phase camera as reported previously. It was realigned during that break, but the alignment drifted away again over a month following the break.

Figure 3 shows data in July 2025, with the PC misaligned, and the interferometer in LN2 around 18:00 UTC. Note that the vertical scale is the same as in figure 1, highlighting there is 5 times less power on the phase camera than there used to be. 

Figure 4 zooms the horizontal axis, about 65% of the power detected by the phase camera is in the carrier light in LN2. However, given that the phase camera is strongly misaligned this data may be misleading, as most of the light is likely actually not reaching the phase camera.

Figure 5. Coming back to the 2024 data that should be reliable, the power on B1p in LN2 is ~275mW. With 80% of carrier light that corresponds to 220mW. The contrast defect of CD = 2 * B1p / P_PRC = 2*220e-3/17/39 = 660ppm. In LN3 the power on B1p is 150mW, with 60% of it in carrier light, so 90mW of carrier light, and a contrast defect of 2*90e-3/17/39 = 270ppm, which is within the error bars of the 286+/-24ppm reported in the O4 optical characterization paper (VIR-0710B-24).

/users/mwas/PC/PC_contrast_20251211/longTermTrend.m

The NEB and WEB PCal fast server configurations have been updated to allow to use or PD1_DC or PD2_DC to allow the PCAL lines injections.

Operations performed at 2025-12-12-04h03m51-UTC

After these operations, the PCAL loops were succesfully closed with the PCAL lines injected 

• PCAL_NEB: using Tx_PD2_DC instead Tx_PD1_DC as the power on Tx_PD1 is lower than usual 
• PCAL_WEB: using Tx_PD1_DC as usual . By mistake Tx_PD2_DC was set, restored to Tx_PD1_DC at 2025-12-12-09h52m08-UTC 

The WEB magnetic line injections were stopped this morning at 08:29:12 UTC.

Due to the comb lines spaced by 0.1 Hz, we changed the frequencies of all injected lines and increased the amplitude of the first four lines in order to improve their SNR.

*** The injection started at 21:02:51 UTC in the WE building, and it will be stopped manually tomorrow morning****

ITF found in Commissioning mode and in LN2;  activity of SDB1 angular injections in progress.

At around 14:30 UTC started the planned activity of  Removing B5 beam from SDB1 control and automating it ; actvity concluded at 20:10 UTC.

Then, with the ITF locked in LN3, Maria and Irene from remote started to inject magnetic lines; the injections will remain active for the night.

The ITF has been left in relocking phase (lock of the OMC) and in Commissioning mode (state requested for the ENV injections); in agreement with Diego tha autorelock has not been enabled.

After 2 hours the interferometer has unlocked with an accelarating drift in MICH offset and BS TY INPUT. It is likely related to the changes made earlier this afternoon. I have tried to comment out all of the changes and go back to the previous (standard) control for SDB1.

When trying to move the B1p QD1 112MHz centering actuator from the
quadrant galvo to the SDB1 bench after a minute or two the BS
alignment start diverging. I don't understand why. It doesn't seem to
have been a problem during the test in July:
https://logbook.virgo-gw.eu/virgo/?r=67410

Either the problem is new, I don't remember a change needed to make it
work in July, or it wasn't a problem because I did not stay long
enough in DRMI and moved on with the lock acquisition where the BS
drift control is disabled. The last explanation is the most likely as
doing the swap just before leaving DRMI 3F worked and the lock
acquistion continued to CARM NULL 1F.

But before arriving that I have made many trials, and ended up
increasing the H gain of B1p 112MHz for SDB1 control by a factor 4,
and the V gain by a factor 6.

Changing B1p QD1 alignment with picomotors so zero of 112MHz error signal
matches good alignment of SDB1 in CARM NULL 1F.

B1p_M2_H -400 steps
B1p_M2_V +700 steps

After that the lock acquisition could continue to LN3 without problems
(with the usual SR TY +2 urad before locking the OMC).

Once in LN2 there is the issue that DARM drift control moves the beam
away from the center of B1p QD1. As the low frequency control becomes
the OMC alignment, and no longer the B1p 112MHz quadrant signal. Some
solution may be needed for that if it proves to be a problem. For
example turn on the B1p galvo with very low gain to remove that
offset.

Commented out the enable of SDB1 drift control in
LOCKED_DRMI_3F_ASC_FULL of DRMI_LOCK

Put it instead in SETTING_CARM_OFFSET_MID of ITF_LOCK along with
disabling the B1p QD1 galvo

17:46 UTC Unlocked on purpose and reloaded DRMI_LOCK and ITF_LOCK to
see if automating this procedure works.

Relock to CARM NULL 1F was successful at first attempt

Added to automation offsets into the B1p QD1 galvo correction, as a
simple correction to keep the quadrant centered when the OMC drift
control is enabled. In the future it will need to be replaced by some
slow loop to keep the quadrant centered.

Unlocked when trying to stop the automation to correct a type before
reaching LOW NOISE 2.

Unlocked when trying to adjust the galvo correction offset in LN2 too
fast, as the OMC drift control was not compensating for it.

Put a value of 2.5 in horizontal in the automation and increased ramp
time to 300 seconds. Also added a reset to zero in the DOWN state, but
haven't checked that it works. Probably a larger offset is actually
needed to have the quadrant centered, and some offset on the vertical
direction too.

Note that after DRMI 3F it is now normal that the B1p QD1 galvo loop
is open. I have adjusted the DMS flag accordingly
 

The investigation of the 401 Hz peak was carried out at the turbo pump of the INJ tower. It is worth reminding that, unlike the DET tower, there is no bellow between the turbo pump and the INJ tower.

We injected magnetic and seismic lines at 390, 395, 401, 405, and 410 Hz.

The amplitudes of the injected seismic and magnetic lines were tuned to match the amplitude of the 401 Hz line observed in the accelerometer (ENV_IB_ACC*) and magnetometer (ENV_IB_MAG*).

From a preliminary look, we noticed:

• Seismic line injections: the lines at 390 Hz (ampl = 0.2), 395 Hz (ampl = 0.4), and 410 Hz (ampl = 1.6) arose in Hrec.

• Magnetic line injections: for the coil axis along the North arm and vertical directions, the line at 405 Hz (ampl = 0.8) arose in the sensitivity.

• Figure 1: during the seismic injections, some lines also became visible in the magnetometer, probably because the oscillation of the tower generates a modulation of the Earth-field lines.

The details of the actions performed are reported in the attached files.

This afternoon, we continued the activity initiated last monday (https://logbook.virgo-gw.eu/virgo/?r=68327) to measure the coupling of angular noise injections on the SDB1 bench marionetta, given different conditions of SDB1 alignment.

ITF locked in Low Noise 2 at 12h57 utc.

Taking reference data from 12h58m00 utc (7 min).

2.1/ SDB1 bench aligned

Injection in TY:

Injecting noise with ampl = 4e-5, pole at 40 Hz, corresponding to 8e-2V/sqrt(Hz) above 40 Hz on SDB1_MAR_TY_corr at 13h05m28 UTC (4 min). FIG.1

We notice that even after switching off the noise, there is still a resonance around 90 Hz which is excited. See FIG.2.

We also notice a change in the noise floor above 1 kHz and around 40 Hz.

Therefore we take another reference from 13h14 to 13h18.

Injection in TX:

Injecting noise with ampl = 5e-7, pole at 80 Hz, corresponding to 3.5e-3V/sqrt(Hz) above 80 Hz on SDB1_MAR_TX_corr at 13h18m04 UTC (4 min) FIG.3.

2.2/ SDB1 bench misaligned inTY

Reference position of the bench in TY is : 69.5 urad

TY loop gain set to 0 at 13h25m10

Add an offset of 3 urad in TY at 13h27m33 with a ramp of 60 s.  After observing large fluctuations of the optical gain, we decided to reduce the offset to 2 urad (13h33m00). The bench TY is now around 67 urad.

Taking reference sensitivity data with bench misaligned from 13h33

Injecting noise with ampl = 2e-5, pole at 40 Hz, corresponding to 4e-2V/sqrt(Hz) above 40 Hz on SDB1_MAR_TY_corr at 13h39m21 UTC (4 min). FIG.4

We increased the offset to 2.5 urad at 13h46m03

We increase the offset to 3.0 urad at 13h48m38 with ramp of 20 s. The bench is around TY = 65.5 urad (4 urad of misalignment). Collecting data for 5 min. FIG.5

Offset increased to 4.0 urad with ramp of 40 s at 13h55m08 utc. The bench is around TY = 63.5 urad (6 urad of misalignment). Collecting data for 4 min. FIG.6

We remove the offset from 14h01m13 with a ramp of 120s. The bench reaches the position TY = 70 urad. Collecting data for reference from 14h03m13 to 14h07m13.

We put a negative offset of -3 urad starting from 14h09m41 with a ramp of 120s. The bench reaches the position TY=73.5 urad. Collecting data for 4 min (FIG.7)

We increase the negative offset to -4urad from 14h17m22 with a ramp of 40s. The bench reaches the position TY= 74.5 urad. Collecting data for 4 min (FIG.8)

We switch off the TY noise at 14h22m08 utc and collect again data for 4 min (FIG.9).

We remove the alignment offset from 14h29m22 utc with a ramp of 120s.

We re-enable the TY loop gain at 14h33m51 utc.

Collecting data with bench aligned and no noise from 14h34 utc (4 min).

2.3/ SDB1 bench misaligned in TX (unsuccessful)

We switch-off the TX loop gain at 14h38m05 utc. The bench is aligned around TX = 87 urad.

We misaligned TX by 2urad from 14h40m25 (with ramp of 60 s) but the ITF unlocked due to a too large misalignment of the bench (which actually moved by around 9 urad).

We stopped this activity here.

ITF found locked at LN3 in COMMISSIONING mode.
Magnetic line injections concluded at 06:18 UTC. 07:02 UTC, DQSTUDIES mode set.
ITF unlocked (TBC) at 07:25 UTC and auto-relocked at LN3 at first attempt just in time for the planned activity on WE WiFi Test (Ballester) started at 08:11 UTC. Upon concluded (08:50 UTC) ITF unlocked (TBC).
ITF relocked at LN3 for the planned INJ mag and seis injections. Started at 10:00 UTC.
At 13:00 UTC, upon reached LN2, Gouaty started the planned activity on SDB1 angular injections. Still in progress...

DET
07:11 UTC - B1p_QD1 galvo loop found open. Properly closed via VPM.

A first look at data show that:

injected lines at 6.7 Hz and above are all well visible in hrec (using 1000s spectral resolution)

Yet, the choice of setting lines's frequency at multiples of 0.1 was not good, because of the presence (forgotten) of an underline 0.1Hz spaced comb which is largely coherent between hrec and magnetometers. Therefore, we would possibly repeat the injection with a better choice of frequencies. 

Injected lines below 6.7 Hz are not seen in hrec (although there is margin of improving, for example removing loud glitches...). These freqeuncies should be amplified. Indeed there is margin (before saturating the amplifier) to safely double their amplitude. 

I ve repeated the analysis shown in logentry # 68214, having the starting time (the 0) when I ve equalized the controls of the NI and WI to spot if this could have an effect on the response to the YAG.

As it was expected nothing changed, since the effect of the YAG on the mirror temperature is too fast to be corrected with the etalon loop. It is visible that the effect of the YAG is 2.5 larger on the WI wrt the NI.

Moreover if I compute the difference between the delta temperature, to remove common temperature variation due to external disturbances, it is visible from the bottom plot that the WI temperature decrease of ~0.01 [C] more than the NI after 1h of missing YAG.

Analysis :

I' ve made a simple analysis. I ve taken since the start of the run, the 0 correspond to when I ve equalized the controllers of WI and NI, all the data set for which the ITF was locked in steps >carm 0 for at least 1h and unlocked for 1h later and compared the delta in temperature from the unlock (when the YAG just disappears) and 1h later.

The magnetic line injections were stopped at 06:18:44 UTC.

This evening, we resumed the magnetic line injection (elog #62843). Due to some issues with the Automatic Injection code, we used the ENVnoise process from the VPM interface instead.

We tuned the amplitude of the lines, starting with the WE building.

All the lines are injected simultaneously. The frequencies and amplitudes (sent to DAC) are reported in the table below. 

During the tuning, the interferometer unlocked and the auto-relock process got stuck. We contacted Diego, who fixed the problem.

*** We left the WEB magnetic line injection running for the entire night, and tomorrow morning the injection will be stopped manually. ***

So putting the arrows in the right places woud reduce the estimated ratio of 56 MHz to carrier power by roughly a factor 2, that is, closer to the phase camera result. However the uncertainty in OMC scan analysis is very large. A simpler check is to compare B1p phase camera and B1p photodiode in conditions of different ratio of carrier and sidebands. During CITF lock the carrier power in the ITF is largely suppressed, and dark fringe power is dominated by the 56 MHz SB.  The attached plot from 12/10/25 compares the B1p camera DC signals and the B1p photodiode. The total power on B1p phase camera, i.e. the sum of carrier, 56 MHz, and 6 MHz powers, is displayed in dark green. In the left part the ITF is locked in CITF, and carrier power is negligible. In the right part carrier power is higher than individual 56 MHz sidebands. The trend of total power from phase camera matches the B1p PD, showing that the ratio of carrier to sidebands from phase camera signal is basically correct.  

An independent analysis of carrier contrast defect is displayed on VIM, where carrier power from B1p and B4 phase cameras are compared to reference values in single bounce to get rid of calibration drifts: 

CD = 2 * TSR* [ Power(B1p_PC) / Power(B1p_PC single bounce)] / [ Power(B4_PC) / Power(B4_PC single bounce) ]

(B1p_PC and B4_PC, are the Phase Camera signals taken for the Carrier)

The VIM computation is in good agreement with the analysis in VIR-1178A-25. In particular, around October 12 the VIM computation shows a contrast defect around 50 ppm in LN3 and 200 PPM in LN2.