Search for Long-Lived Gravitational-Wave Transients Coincident with Long Gamma-Ray Bursts

J. Aasi, LIGO - California Institute of Technology
J. Abadie, Louisiana State University
B. P. Abbott, Universite de Savoie
R. Abbott, University of Naples Federico II
T. Abbott, University of Salerno
M. R. Abernathy, California Institute of Technology
T. Accadia, Cardiff University
F. Acernese, Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute)
C. Adams, National Institute for Subatomic Physics
T. Adams, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
R. X. Adhikari, National Institute for Space Research
C. Affeldt, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
M. Agathos, Leibniz University Hannover
N. Aggarwal, Sezione di Pisa
O. D. Aguiar, University of Siena
P. Ajith, University of Florida
B. Allen, University of Mississippi
A. Allocca, California State University Fullerton
E. Amador Ceron, National Institute for Nuclear Physics
D. Amariutei, University of Birmingham
R. A. Anderson, Montana State University
S. B. Anderson, European Gravitational Observatory
W. G. Anderson, Syracuse University
K. Arai, National Science Foundation
M. C. Araya, University of Glasgow
C. Arceneaux, Universite Paris 7
J. Areeda, Columbia University
S. Ast, Stanford University
S. M. Aston, University of Pisa
P. Astone, Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomical Center of the Polish Academy of Sciences

Abstract

Long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) have been linked to extreme core-collapse supernovae from massive stars. Gravitational waves (GW) offer a probe of the physics behind long GRBs. We investigate models of long-lived (∼10-1000 s) GW emission associated with the accretion disk of a collapsed star or with its protoneutron star remnant. Using data from LIGO's fifth science run, and GRB triggers from the Swift experiment, we perform a search for unmodeled long-lived GW transients. Finding no evidence of GW emission, we place 90% confidence-level upper limits on the GW fluence at Earth from long GRBs for three waveforms inspired by a model of GWs from accretion disk instabilities. These limits range from F<3.5 ergs cm-2 to F<1200 ergs cm -2, depending on the GRB and on the model, allowing us to probe optimistic scenarios of GW production out to distances as far as ≈33 Mpc. Advanced detectors are expected to achieve strain sensitivities 10× better than initial LIGO, potentially allowing us to probe the engines of the nearest long GRBs.