RUI: Sensitive Searches for Compact Binary Coalescence in LIGO Data

该项目继续开发和使用先进的软件算法，在先进激光干涉仪引力波天文台（LIGO）的数据中搜索引力波——爱因斯坦引力理论预测的时空涟漪。这些是宇宙中一些最具能量事件的预测特征，包括中子星和黑洞，它们相互绕轨道运行，向内旋转并碰撞。探测到这种碰撞产生的引力波将直接证实爱因斯坦理论的预测，也将使测量产生引力波的中子星或黑洞的特性成为可能。这些性质通常很难通过目前的望远镜和卫星观测间接测量出来。该提案的更广泛影响将包括培养新生领域引力波天文学的本科生，并通过短视频和公开演讲向更广泛的公众传播该领域的初步成果。本提案将解决的具体问题是对非自旋和对准自旋系统的紧凑二进制合并源的离线匹配过滤器搜索的调整和部署，以及对进动自旋系统的搜索的开发和测试。这将使用PyCBC管道工具包完成，PI是该工具包的开发人员，并且对处理搜索的调优研究和调查将分别测试各自搜索对从早期LIGO运行和工程运行收集的模拟数据挑战（Mock Data Challenge， MDC）数据的检测灵敏度。这些检测灵敏度研究将反过来用于决定调谐选择，以及用于处理搜索，是否通过搜索处理波形模板参数空间来提高整体检测效率。通过让ACU本地的本科生以及前往德国汉诺威的阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦研究所参与这项研究，将产生更广泛的影响。此外，PI和他的学生已经制作了关于相对论的简短教育视频，公众宣传将继续进行。

This project continues the development and use of advanced software algorithms to search for gravitational waves - ripples in spacetime predicted by Einstein's theory of gravity - in data from the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO). These are a predicted signature of some of the most energetic events in the universe, including neutron stars and black holes that orbit one another and spiral inwards and collide. The detection of gravitational waves from such collisions will allow a direct confirmation of this prediction of Einstein's theory, and will also allow measurement of the properties of the neutron stars or black holes whose collision generated the waves. Such properties are often difficult to measure indirectly through present observations with telescopes and satellites. The broader impacts of this proposal will include the training of undergraduate students in the nascent field of gravitational wave astronomy, and dissemination of the first results of that field to the broader public through short videos and public talks. The specific problem this proposal will address is the tuning and deployment of an offline, matched-filter search for compact binary coalescing sources for non-spinning and aligned-spin systems, and the development and testing of a search for precessing spin systems. This will be done using the PyCBC pipeline toolkit of which the PI is a developer, and the tuning studies and investigation of precessing searches will each test the detection sensitivity of their respective searches on Mock Data Challenge (MDC) data collected from earlier LIGO running and engineering runs. These detection sensitivity studies will in turn be used to decide on tuning choices, and for precessing searches, whether overall detection efficiency is improved by searching over a precessing waveform template parameter space. Broader impacts will be achieved by involving undergraduates in this research both locally at ACU, and by traveling to the Albert Einstein Institute in Hannover, Germany. Additionally, public outreach will continue the sequence of short, educational videos that the PI and his students have already made on relativity.