An official website of the United States government
Abstract The Wide-Field Infrared Transient Explorer (WINTER) is a new 1 deg2seeing-limited time-domain survey instrument designed for dedicated near-infrared follow-up of kilonovae from binary neutron star (BNS) and neutron star–black hole mergers. WINTER will observe in the near-infraredY,J, and short-Hbands (0.9–1.7μm, toJAB= 21 mag) on a dedicated 1 m telescope at Palomar Observatory. To date, most prompt kilonova follow-up has been in optical wavelengths; however, near-infrared emission fades more slowly and depends less on geometry and viewing angle than optical emission. We present an end-to-end simulation of a follow-up campaign during the fourth observing run (O4) of the LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA interferometers, including simulating 625 BNS mergers, their detection in gravitational waves, low-latency and full parameter estimation skymaps, and a suite of kilonova lightcurves from two different model grids. We predict up to five new kilonovae independently discovered by WINTER during O4, given a realistic BNS merger rate. Using a larger grid of kilonova parameters, we find that kilonova emission is ≈2 times longer lived and red kilonovae are detected ≈1.5 times further in the infrared than in the optical. For 90% localization areas smaller than 150 (450) deg2, WINTER will be sensitive to more than 10% of the kilonova model grid out to 350 (200) Mpc. We develop a generalized toolkit to create an optimal BNS follow-up strategy with any electromagnetic telescope and present WINTER’s observing strategy with this framework. This toolkit, all simulated gravitational-wave events, and skymaps are made available for use by the community.
more »
« less
Cosmic Explorer MPSAC Dataset
This dataset contains the compact binary populations that were used in the Cosmic Explorer MPSAC White paper1 (submitted to the NSF MPSAC ngGW Subcommittee) and the accompanying technical paper2. Contents: 1. 1-year populations for binary black hole (BBH), binary neutron star (BNS), neutron star-black hole (NSBH), intermediate mass binary black hole (IMBBH), Population III (Pop 3) binary black holes and primordial black hole (PBH) mergers. It also contains the SNRs and measurement errors on intrinsic and extrinsic parameters calculated using gwbench3. 2. 1/4-year sub-population of BNS mergers for which errors on tidal parameters were calculated. 3. An ipython notebook (instructions.ipynb) that shows how the data can be used. References: 1. Evans, Matthew et al. Cosmic Explorer: A Submission to the NSF MPSAC ngGW Subcommittee (2023). arXiv: 2306.13745 [gr-qc]. 2. Gupta, Ish et al. Characterizing Gravitational Wave Detector Networks: From A# to Cosmic Explorer (2023). In preparation. 3. Borhanian, Ssohrab. GWBENCH: a novel Fisher information package for gravitational-wave benchmarking. Class. Quant. Grav. 38, 175014 (2021). arXiv: 2010.15202 [gr-qc].
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 2309064
- PAR ID:
- 10591498
- Publisher / Repository:
- Zenodo
- Date Published:
- Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
- gravitational wave cosmic explorer next generation
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Right(s):
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International; Open Access
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Abstract The formation histories of compact binary mergers, especially stellar-mass binary black hole mergers, have recently come under increased scrutiny and revision. We revisit the question of the dominant formation channel and efficiency of forming binary neutron star (BNS) mergers. We use the stellar and binary evolution codeMESAand implement a detailed method for common envelope and mass transfer. We perform simulations for donor masses between 7 M⊙and 20 M⊙with a neutron star (NS) companion of 1.4 M⊙and 2.0 M⊙ at two metallicities, using varying common envelope efficiencies and two different prescriptions to determine if the donor undergoes core collapse or electron capture, given their helium and carbon–oxygen cores. In contrast to the case of binary black hole mergers, for an NS companion of 1.4 M⊙, all BNS mergers are formed following a common envelope phase. For an NS mass of 2.0 M⊙, we identify a small subset of mergers following only stable mass transfer if the NS receives a natal kick sampled from a Maxwellian distribution with velocity dispersionσ= 265 km s−1. Regardless of the supernova prescription, we find more BNS mergers at subsolar metallicity compared to solar.more » « less
-
Abstract We present our current best estimate of the plausible observing scenarios for the Advanced LIGO, Advanced Virgo and KAGRA gravitational-wave detectors over the next several years, with the intention of providing information to facilitate planning for multi-messenger astronomy with gravitational waves. We estimate the sensitivity of the network to transient gravitational-wave signals for the third (O3), fourth (O4) and fifth observing (O5) runs, including the planned upgrades of the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo detectors. We study the capability of the network to determine the sky location of the source for gravitational-wave signals from the inspiral of binary systems of compact objects, that is binary neutron star, neutron star–black hole, and binary black hole systems. The ability to localize the sources is given as a sky-area probability, luminosity distance, and comoving volume. The median sky localization area (90% credible region) is expected to be a few hundreds of square degrees for all types of binary systems during O3 with the Advanced LIGO and Virgo (HLV) network. The median sky localization area will improve to a few tens of square degrees during O4 with the Advanced LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA (HLVK) network. During O3, the median localization volume (90% credible region) is expected to be on the order of $$10^{5}, 10^{6}, 10^{7}\mathrm {\ Mpc}^3$$ 10 5 , 10 6 , 10 7 Mpc 3 for binary neutron star, neutron star–black hole, and binary black hole systems, respectively. The localization volume in O4 is expected to be about a factor two smaller than in O3. We predict a detection count of $$1^{+12}_{-1}$$ 1 - 1 + 12 ( $$10^{+52}_{-10}$$ 10 - 10 + 52 ) for binary neutron star mergers, of $$0^{+19}_{-0}$$ 0 - 0 + 19 ( $$1^{+91}_{-1}$$ 1 - 1 + 91 ) for neutron star–black hole mergers, and $$17^{+22}_{-11}$$ 17 - 11 + 22 ( $$79^{+89}_{-44}$$ 79 - 44 + 89 ) for binary black hole mergers in a one-calendar-year observing run of the HLV network during O3 (HLVK network during O4). We evaluate sensitivity and localization expectations for unmodeled signal searches, including the search for intermediate mass black hole binary mergers.more » « less
-
A direct detection of black hole formation in neutron star mergers would provide invaluable information about matter in neutron star cores and finite temperature effects on the nuclear equation of state. We study black hole formation in neutron star mergers using a set of 190 numerical relativity simulations consisting of long-lived and black-hole-forming remnants. The postmerger gravitational-wave spectrum of a long-lived remnant has greatly reduced power at a frequency f greater than fpeak, for f ≳ 4 kHz, with fpeak in [2.5, 4] kHz. On the other hand, black-hole-forming remnants exhibit excess power in the same large f region and manifest exponential damping in the time domain characteristic of a quasinormal mode. We demonstrate that the gravitational-wave signal from a collapsed remnant is indeed a quasinormal ringing. We report on the opportunity for direct detections of black hole formation with next-generation gravitational-wave detectors such as Cosmic Explorer and Einstein Telescope and set forth the tantalizing prospect of such observations up to a distance of 100 Mpc for an optimally oriented and located source with an SNR of 4.more » « less
-
Abstract We search for gravitational-wave (GW) transients associated with fast radio bursts (FRBs) detected by the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment Fast Radio Burst Project, during the first part of the third observing run of Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo (2019 April 1 15:00 UTC–2019 October 1 15:00 UTC). Triggers from 22 FRBs were analyzed with a search that targets both binary neutron star (BNS) and neutron star–black hole (NSBH) mergers. A targeted search for generic GW transients was conducted on 40 FRBs. We find no significant evidence for a GW association in either search. Given the large uncertainties in the distances of our FRB sample, we are unable to exclude the possibility of a GW association. Assessing the volumetric event rates of both FRB and binary mergers, an association is limited to 15% of the FRB population for BNS mergers or 1% for NSBH mergers. We report 90% confidence lower bounds on the distance to each FRB for a range of GW progenitor models and set upper limits on the energy emitted through GWs for a range of emission scenarios. We find values of order 1051–1057erg for models with central GW frequencies in the range 70–3560 Hz. At the sensitivity of this search, we find these limits to be above the predicted GW emissions for the models considered. We also find no significant coincident detection of GWs with the repeater, FRB 20200120E, which is the closest known extragalactic FRB.more » « less
