Engineering topics

Hanna, Chad

Publications and source records attributed to Hanna, Chad.

7 records

DOE OSTI2017

Disentangling the Potential Dark Matter Origin of LIGO’s Black Holes

The nature of dark matter (DM) remains one of the biggest open questions in physics. One intriguing DM candidate, primordial black holes (PBHs), has faced renewed interest following the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory’s (LIGO) detection of gravitational waves from merging stellar mass black holes. While subsequent work has ruled out the possibility that DM could consist solely of black holes similar to those that LIGO has detected with masses above 10 M{sub ⊙}, LIGO’s connection to DM remains unknown. In this work, we consider a distribution of PBHs that accounts for all of the DM, is consistent with all of LIGO’s observations arising from PBH binaries, and resolves tension in previous surveys of microlensing events in the Milky Way halo. The PBH mass distribution that we consider offers an important prediction—LIGO may detect black holes smaller than have ever been observed with ∼1% of the black holes it detects having a mass less than the mass of our Sun and ∼10% with masses in the mass gap. Approximately one year of operating advanced LIGO at design sensitivity should be adequate to begin to see a hint of a primordial black hole mass distribution. Detecting PBH binaries below a solar mass will be readily distinguishable from other known compact binary systems, thereby providing an unambiguous observational window for advanced LIGO to pin down the nature of DM.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2016

Parameter estimation on gravitational waves from neutron-star binaries with spinning components

Inspiraling binary neutron stars (BNSs) are expected to be one of the most significant sources of gravitational-wave signals for the new generation of advanced ground-based detectors. We investigate how well we could hope to measure properties of these binaries using the Advanced LIGO detectors, which began operation in September 2015. We study an astrophysically motivated population of sources (binary components with masses 1.2 M{sub ⊙}--1.6 M{sub ⊙} and spins of less than 0.05) using the full LIGO analysis pipeline. While this simulated population covers the observed range of potential BNS sources, we do not exclude the possibility of sources with parameters outside these ranges; given the existing uncertainty in distributions of mass and spin, it is critical that analyses account for the full range of possible mass and spin configurations. We find that conservative prior assumptions on neutron-star mass and spin lead to average fractional uncertainties in component masses of ∼16%, with little constraint on spins (the median 90% upper limit on the spin of the more massive component is ∼0.7). Stronger prior constraints on neutron-star spins can further constrain mass estimates but only marginally. However, we find that the sky position and luminosity distance for these sources are not influenced by the inclusion of spin; therefore, if LIGO detects a low-spin population of BNS sources, less computationally expensive results calculated neglecting spin will be sufficient for guiding electromagnetic follow-up.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2015

Parameter estimation for binary neutron-star coalescences with realistic noise during the advanced LIGO era

Advanced ground-based gravitational-wave (GW) detectors begin operation imminently. Their intended goal is not only to make the first direct detection of GWs, but also to make inferences about the source systems. Binary neutron-star mergers are among the most promising sources. We investigate the performance of the parameter-estimation (PE) pipeline that will be used during the first observing run of the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (aLIGO) in 2015: we concentrate on the ability to reconstruct the source location on the sky, but also consider the ability to measure masses and the distance. Accurate, rapid sky localization is necessary to alert electromagnetic (EM) observatories so that they can perform follow-up searches for counterpart transient events. We consider PE accuracy in the presence of non-stationary, non-Gaussian noise. We find that the character of the noise makes negligible difference to the PE performance at a given signal-to-noise ratio. The source luminosity distance can only be poorly constrained, since the median 90% (50%) credible interval scaled with respect to the true distance is 0.85 (0.38). However, the chirp mass is well measured. Our chirp-mass estimates are subject to systematic error because we used gravitational-waveform templates without component spin to carry out inference on signals with moderate spins, but the total error is typically less than 10{sup −3} M{sub ⊙}. The median 90% (50%) credible region for sky localization is ∼600 deg{sup 2} (∼150 deg{sup 2}), with 3% (30%) of detected events localized within 100 deg{sup 2}. Early aLIGO, with only two detectors, will have a sky-localization accuracy for binary neutron stars of hundreds of square degrees; this makes EM follow-up challenging, but not impossible.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2014

The first two years of electromagnetic follow-up with advanced LIGO and Virgo

We anticipate the first direct detections of gravitational waves (GWs) with Advanced LIGO and Virgo later this decade. Though this groundbreaking technical achievement will be its own reward, a still greater prize could be observations of compact binary mergers in both gravitational and electromagnetic channels simultaneously. During Advanced LIGO and Virgo's first two years of operation, 2015 through 2016, we expect the global GW detector array to improve in sensitivity and livetime and expand from two to three detectors. We model the detection rate and the sky localization accuracy for binary neutron star (BNS) mergers across this transition. We have analyzed a large, astrophysically motivated source population using real-time detection and sky localization codes and higher-latency parameter estimation codes that have been expressly built for operation in the Advanced LIGO/Virgo era. We show that for most BNS events, the rapid sky localization, available about a minute after a detection, is as accurate as the full parameter estimation. We demonstrate that Advanced Virgo will play an important role in sky localization, even though it is anticipated to come online with only one-third as much sensitivity as the Advanced LIGO detectors. We find that the median 90% confidence region shrinks from ∼500 deg{sup 2} in 2015 to ∼200 deg{sup 2} in 2016. A few distinct scenarios for the first LIGO/Virgo detections emerge from our simulations.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2014

Utility of galaxy catalogs for following up gravitational waves from binary neutron star mergers with wide-field telescopes

The first detections of gravitational waves from binary neutron star mergers with advanced LIGO and Virgo observatories are anticipated in the next five years. These detections could pave the way for multi-messenger gravitational-wave (GW) and electromagnetic (EM) astronomy if GW triggers are successfully followed up with targeted EM observations. However, GW sky localization is relatively poor, with expected localization areas of ∼10-100 deg{sup 2}; this presents a challenge for following up GW signals from compact binary mergers. Even for wide-field instruments, tens or hundreds of pointings may be required. Prioritizing pointings based on the relative probability of successful imaging is important since it may not be possible to tile the entire gravitational-wave localization region in a timely fashion. Galaxy catalogs were effective at narrowing down regions of the sky to search in initial attempts at joint GW/EM observations. The relatively limited range of initial GW instruments meant that few galaxies were present per pointing and galaxy catalogs were complete within the search volume. The next generation of GW detectors will have a 10-fold increase in range thereby increasing the expected number of galaxies per unit solid angle by a factor of ∼1000. As an additional complication, catalogs will be highly incomplete. Nevertheless, galaxy catalogs can still play an important role in prioritizing pointings for the next era of GW searches. We show how to quantify the advantages of using galaxy catalogs to prioritize wide-field follow-ups as a function of only two parameters: the three-dimensional volume within the field of view of a telescope after accounting for the GW distance measurement uncertainty, and the fraction of the GW sky localization uncertainty region that can be covered with telescope pointings. We find that the use of galaxy catalogs can improve the probability of successful imaging by ∼10% to ∼300% relative to follow-up strategies that do not utilize such catalogs for the scenarios we considered. We determine that catalogs with a 75% completeness perform comparably to complete catalogs in most cases, while 33%-complete catalogs can lead to lower follow-up success rates than complete catalogs for small fields of view, though still providing an advantage over strategies that do not use a catalog at all.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2012

TOWARD EARLY-WARNING DETECTION OF GRAVITATIONAL WAVES FROM COMPACT BINARY COALESCENCE

Rapid detection of compact binary coalescence (CBC) with a network of advanced gravitational-wave detectors will offer a unique opportunity for multi-messenger astronomy. Prompt detection alerts for the astronomical community might make it possible to observe the onset of electromagnetic emission from CBC. We demonstrate a computationally practical filtering strategy that could produce early-warning triggers before gravitational radiation from the final merger has arrived at the detectors.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2011

Efficiently enclosing the compact binary parameter space by singular-value decomposition

Gravitational-wave searches for the merger of compact binaries use matched filtering as the method of detecting signals and estimating parameters. Such searches construct a fine mesh of filters covering a signal parameter space at high density. Previously it has been shown that singular-value decomposition can reduce the effective number of filters required to search the data. Here we study how the basis provided by the singular-value decomposition changes dimension as a function of template-bank density. We will demonstrate that it is sufficient to use the basis provided by the singular-value decomposition of a low-density bank to accurately reconstruct arbitrary points within the boundaries of the template bank. Since this technique is purely numerical, it may have applications to interpolating the space of numerical relativity waveforms.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗