INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS PUBLISHING CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM GRAVITY Class. Quantum Grav. 23 (2006) S751–S760 doi:10.1088/0264-9381/23/19/S14 The LISA benchtop simulator at the University of

At the University of Florida, we are developing an experimental Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) simulator. The foundation for the simulator is a pair of cavity-stabilized lasers that provide realistic, LISA-like phase noise. The light travel time over the five million kilometres between spacecraft is recreated in the lab by use of an electronic phase delay technique. Initial tests will focus on phasemeter implementation, time delay interferometry (TDI) and arm-locking. In this paper we present the frequency stabilization results, results from an electronic arm-locking experiment, software phasemeter performance and results from a first optical experiment to test the TDI concept. In the future, the benchtop simulator will be extended to test several other aspects of LISA interferometry such as clock noise and Doppler shifts of the signals. The eventual long-term use of the LISA simulator will be to provide realistic data streams, including all the noise components, into which model gravitational wave signals can be injected. This will make the simulator a useful testbed for data analysis research groups. PACS numbers: 42.60.−v, 95.75.Kk, 95.85.Sz (Some figures in this article are in colour only in the electronic version) 1