Search NASA⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Homeier, A.

Publications and source records attributed to Homeier, A..

Swift Follow-Up of IceCube Triggers, and Implications for the Advanced-LIGO Era

Between 2011 March and 2014 August Swift responded to 20 triggers from the IceCube neutrino observatory, observing the IceCube 50 per cent confidence error circle in X-rays, typically within 5 h of the trigger. No confirmed counterpart has been detected. We describe the Swift follow-up strategy and data analysis and present the results of the campaign. We discuss the challenges of distinguishing the X-ray counterpart to a neutrino trigger from serendipitous uncatalogued X-ray sources in the error circle, and consider the implications of our results for future strategies for multimessenger astronomy, with particular reference to the follow-up of gravitational wave triggers from the advanced-era detectors.

Evans, P. A.↗

The Astrophysical Multimessenger Observatory Network (AMON)

We summarize the science opportunity, design elements, current and projected partner observatories, and anticipated science returns of the Astrophysical Multimessenger Observatory Network (AMON). AMON will link multiple current and future high-energy, multimessenger, and follow-up observatories together into a single network, enabling near real-time coincidence searches for multimessenger astrophysical transients and their electromagnetic counterparts. Candidate and high-confidence multimessenger transient events will be identified, characterized, and distributed as AMON alerts within the network and to interested external observers, leading to follow-up observations across the electromagnetic spectrum. In this way, AMON aims to evoke the discovery of multimessenger transients from within observatory subthreshold data streams and facilitate the exploitation of these transients for purposes of astronomy and fundamental physics. As a central hub of global multimessenger science, AMON will also enable cross-collaboration analyses of archival datasets in search of rare or exotic astrophysical phenomena.

comparison↗