First Narrow-Band Search for Continuous Gravitational Waves from Known Pulsars In Advanced Detector Data
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
12-15-2017
Journal / Book Title
Physical Review D
Abstract
Spinning neutron stars asymmetric with respect to their rotation axis are potential sources of continuous gravitational waves for ground-based interferometric detectors. In the case of known pulsars a fully coherent search, based on matched filtering, which uses the position and rotational parameters obtained from electromagnetic observations, can be carried out. Matched filtering maximizes the signal-to-noise (SNR) ratio, but a large sensitivity loss is expected in case of even a very small mismatch betweenn the assumed and the true signal parameters. For this reason, narrow-band analysis methods have been developed, allowing a fully coherent search for gravitational waves from known pulsars over a fraction of a hertz and several spin-down values. In this paper we describe a narrow-band search of 11 pulsars using data from Advanced LIGO's first observing run. Although we have found several initial outliers, further studies show no significant evidence for the presence of a gravitational wave signal. Finally, we have placed upper limits on the signal strain amplitude lower than the spin-down limit for 5 of the 11 targets over the bands searched; in the case of J1813-1749 the spin-down limit has been beaten for the first time. For an additional 3 targets, the median upper limit across the search bands is below the spin-down limit. This is the most sensitive narrow-band search for continuous gravitational waves carried out so far.
DOI
10.1103/PhysRevD.96.122006
MSU Digital Commons Citation
The LIGO Scientific Collaboration; The Virgo Collaboration; Favata, Marc; Ghosh, Shaon; and Martin, Rodica, "First Narrow-Band Search for Continuous Gravitational Waves from Known Pulsars In Advanced Detector Data" (2017). Department of Physics and Astronomy Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works. 56.
https://digitalcommons.montclair.edu/physics-astron-facpubs/56
Published Citation
Abbott, B. P., Abbott, R., Abbott, T. D., Acernese, F., Ackley, K., Adams, C., ... & Camp, J. B. (2017). First narrow-band search for continuous gravitational waves from known pulsars in advanced detector data. Physical Review D, 96(12), 122006.
Comments
This work is part of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration. Additional authors may be found on the publication.