LISA reaches a crucial milestone
The future gravitational-wave observatory in space completes a rigorous review
© NASA/JPL-Caltech/NASAEA/ESA/CXC/STScl/GSFCSVS/S.Barke (CC BY 4.0)
LISA Pathfinder - A Space Saga
Relive the groundbreaking technology demonstrator's mission milestones 5 years ago in a new Youtube mini-series released by the LISA Consortium.
LISA Pathfinder being encapsulated within the Vega rocket. © ESA–Manuel Pedoussaut
13th LISA Symposium talks are online
Find out about the exciting future of gravitational wave astrophysics in space!
Artist's impression of a LISA spacecraft. © AEI/MM/exozet
ESA ministers commit to biggest ever budget
The significant boost in funding for ESA’s world-class and inspirational science programme will allow the first gravitational wave detector in space, LISA, to fly alongside the black hole mission Athena.
ESA’s Council at Ministerial Level, Space19+, has concluded in Seville, Spain, with the endorsement of the most ambitious plan to date for the future of ESA and the whole European space sector. Image: ESA
Why we need a gravitational wave observatory in space
The science case for LISA
Merging Black Holes. Credit: T. Pyle/LIGO
The Gravitational Universe
Illuminating the dark universe with a new astronomy
Artist's impression of supermassive black hole. Credit: ESA/NASA, AVO project, Paolo Padovani.
LISA: A New Astronomy
Laser Interferometer Space Antenna
Artist's impression of LISA satellite. Credit: AEI/MM/exozet
The LISA Mission Homepage
LISA - observing gravitational waves in space
LISA will be a large-scale space mission designed to detect one of the most elusive phenomena in astronomy - gravitational waves. With LISA we will be able to observe the entire universe directly with gravitational waves, learning about the formation of structure and galaxies, stellar evolution, the early universe, and the structure and nature of spacetime itself.
The LISA Pathfinder Mission successfully paved the way for the LISA mission by demonstrating the key technologies for a large gravitational wave observatory in space. The results show that LISA Pathfinder is working to a precision better than required for LISA. The LISA Pathfinder mission was launched on 3rd December 2015 and ended in July 2017.
The LISA Consortium
The LISA Consortium is committed to supporting the LISA mission. It includes all the main investigators involved in the highly successful LISA Pathfinder mission, a number of scientists who worked on the ground-based LIGO, Virgo, and GEO projects, and a number who worked on the Laser Ranging Interferometer on the GRACE Follow-On mission, thus making full use of the expertise accumulated so far. The LISA Consortium proposed and submitted the white paper The Gravitational Universe which was accepted for the ESA L3 slot.
If you are a scientist and wish to contribute to the LISA mission, use this scientist registration form.
Latest news and consortium activities
Conferences, publications and positions
