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Magnets are Weber Bar Gravitational Wave Detectors

Valerie Domcke1, Sebastian A. R. Ellis2, and Nicholas L. Rodd3,4

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Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 231401 – Published 12 June, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/966v-r5fm

Abstract

When a gravitational wave (GW) passes through a dc magnetic field, it couples to the conducting wires carrying the currents which generate the magnetic field, causing them to oscillate at the GW frequency. The oscillating currents then generate an ac component through which the GW can be detected—thus forming a resonant mass detector or a magnetic Weber bar. We quantify this claim and demonstrate that magnets can have exceptional sensitivity to GWs over a frequency range demarcated by the mechanical and electromagnetic resonant frequencies of the system; indeed, we outline why a magnetic readout strategy can be considered an optimal Weber bar design. The concept is applicable to a broad class of magnets, but can be particularly well exploited by the powerful magnets being deployed in search of axion dark matter, for example, by DMRadio and ADMX-EFR. Explicitly, we demonstrate that the MRI magnet that is being deployed for ADMX-EFR can achieve a broadband GW strain sensitivity of ∼10−20/Hz from a few kHz to about 10 MHz, with a peak sensitivity down to ∼10−22/Hz at a kHz exploiting a mechanical resonance.

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Corrections

7 August, 2025

Correction: A typographical error in the second sentence of the abstract that was introduced during the production process has been fixed.

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Outline

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Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 231401– Published 12 June, 2025
  • Received 31 October 2024
  • Revised 17 January 2025
  • Accepted 16 May 2025
  • Corrected 7 August 2025
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