Radio telescopes and gravitational-wave observatories: Two windows on the same Universe

该奖项是根据2009年《美国复苏和再投资法案》(公法111-5)提供资金的。在过去的几十年里，射电天文学已经用一种更具活力的奇异天体和暴力现象取代了我们对恒星和星系的宁静、光学观察。今天，随着新一代天文台准备对一种全新的辐射频谱--引力波--进行首次探测，我们即将迎来另一场天文学革命。该项目将通过世界上最大的射电观测站(阿雷西博和绿岸射电望远镜)和最灵敏的引力波观测站(LIGO和处女座探测器)之间的一系列协调观测，推动射电和引力波天文学领域的发展。该项目的一个组成部分是对被称为射电脉冲星的奇异致密快速旋转恒星进行详细的射电测量。第二个部分是对探测到的任何引力辐射爆发进行快速无线电跟踪观测，例如可能伴随致密恒星和黑洞碰撞的引力辐射。通过获得有关可能也是引力源的已知射电源的准确数据，可以显著提高针对这些物体的引力波搜索的灵敏度。同时，如果假定的引力波爆发伴随着射电发射，这将显著提高人们对这些早期引力波探测的真实性的信心。这两种类型的观测都将加速引力波天文学的到来，为宇宙中一些最奇怪的现象提供互补的观点。这些观察将由从下里奥格兰德河谷招募的受过专门培训的学生观察员干部进行，为该地区学术代表性不足和经济困难的社区提供前所未有的教育和技术机会。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). Over the past few decades, radio astronomy has replaced our serene, optical view of stars and galaxies with a more dynamic one of exotic objects and violent phenomena. Today we are on the verge of another revolution in astronomy, as a new generation of observatories prepare to make the first detections of an entirely new spectrum of radiation: gravitational waves. This project will advance the fields of both radio and gravitational-wave astronomy through a series of coordinated observations between the world's largest radio observatories (the Arecibo and Green Bank radio telescopes), and the most sensitive gravitational-wave observatories (the LIGO and Virgo detectors). One component of the project is to perform detailed radio measurements of exotic compact rapidly-spinning stars known as radio pulsars. A second component would be to perform rapid radio follow-up observations of any detected bursts of gravitational radiation, such as might accompany the collisions of compact stars and black holes.By obtaining precise data on known radio sources that may also be gravitational sources, one can dramatically increase the sensitivity of gravitational-wave searches targeting these objects. Meanwhile, if a putative gravitational-wave burst is accompanied by radio emissions, this will significantly improve confidence in the reality of these early gravitational-wave detections. Both types of observation will hasten the advent of gravitational-wave astronomy, giving complementary views of some of the strangest phenomena in the Universe. These observations will be performed by a specially-trained cadre of student observers recruited from the Lower Rio Grande Valley, providing unprecedented educational and technical opportunities to the academically underrepresented and economically disadvantaged community of this region.