Physics and Astrophysics of Compact Binaries

该奖项支持相对论和相对论天体物理学的研究，它解决了NSF“宇宙之窗”大构想的优先领域。该奖项支持引力波观测研究，以更深入地了解引力和黑洞。大量的财政资源已经投入到实验方面的先进检测器设计，以及在理论/数据分析方面建立紧凑的二进制检测模板的社区努力中。LIGO/Virgo合作项目首次探测到引力波是一个重要的里程碑，但要使引力波科学做出更具开创性的贡献，我们必须能够超越探测，从源的强引力动力学中提取基本物理。随着LIGO/Virgo在接下来的观测中体积覆盖范围的增加，日本KAGRA的运行，宇宙探测器地平线研究的完成，以及爱因斯坦望远镜被纳入2021年ESFRI路线图，这项工作是及时的，旨在扩大地面干涉仪的科学范围。该项目将在一个高度跨学科的领域培养学生，该领域需要在广义相对论、天体物理学、数据分析和高能物理学方面的专业知识。学生将受益于与世界领先的引力物理专家组成的大型国际网络的互动。该奖项支持的项目紧密交织在一起，但为了方便起见，它们可以分为两个主要研究领域：(1)“黑洞光谱学”，即试图通过广义相对论的振荡频率识别合并残余物为黑洞的研究项目；(2)改善引力波天文学中的系统效应。第一组项目研究多个衰荡模式的可探测性、频率的可测量性、更好的衰荡模式振幅模型的构建以及准正态模式谱的不稳定性。第二组研究系统学如何影响广义相对论内的单事件参数估计，导致对广义相对论之外的效应的错误“探测”，并限制我们检验广义相对论和观测引力透镜的能力。PI的小组将在单事件和总体水平上研究系统学对参数估计、广义相对论测试和透镜效应检测的影响。当我们进入第三代干涉仪的大数据时代时，所获得的知识将用于设计自我校正策略，以改善系统学的效果。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award supports research in relativity and relativistic astrophysics, and it addresses the priority areas of NSF's "Windows on the Universe" Big Idea. This award supports studies of gravitational wave observations to gain a deeper understanding of gravity and black holes. Large financial resources have been invested in advanced detector design on the experimental side, and in a community effort to build compact binary detection templates on the theoretical/data analysis side. The first gravitational-wave detections by the LIGO/Virgo collaboration were a major milestone, but for gravitational-wave science to make even more groundbreaking contributions we must be able to go beyond detections, extracting fundamental physics from the strong-gravity dynamics of the sources. With the expected increase in volume coverage of LIGO/Virgo in the next observing runs, the operation of KAGRA in Japan, the completion of the Cosmic Explorer Horizon Study, and the inclusion of the Einstein Telescope in the 2021 ESFRI Roadmap, this work is timely, geared at enhancing the science scope of ground-based interferometers. The project will train students in a highly interdisciplinary field that requires expertise in general relativity, astrophysics, data analysis and high-energy physics. The students will benefit from interactions with a large international network of world-leading experts in gravitational physics.The projects supported by this award are strongly intertwined, but for convenience they can be grouped in two main research areas: (1) "black hole spectroscopy", i.e. the research program trying to identify merger remnants as the black holes predicted by general relativity from their oscillation frequencies; and (2) ameliorating systematic effects in gravitational-wave astronomy. The first set of projects investigates the detectability of multiple ringdown modes, the measurability of their frequencies, the construction of better models for the ringdown mode amplitudes, and instabilities in quasinormal mode spectra. The second set studies how systematics could affect single-event parameter estimation within general relativity, lead to false “detections” of effects beyond general relativity, and limit our ability to test general relativity and observe gravitational lensing. The PI's group will study the effect of systematics on parameter estimation, tests of general relativity and detection of lensing effects, at both the single-event and population levels. The knowledge gained will be used to devise self-correcting strategies to ameliorate the effect of systematics as we enter the Big Data regime of third-generation interferometers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.