Bayesian population study and testing General Relativity with gravitational waves from coalescing binaries

The gravitational wave detectors run by LIGO/VIRGO collaboration have detected 4 gravitational wave (GW) signals from merging BHs. The data from the last (second) observational run are still being analyzed
and more detections might be announced shortly. The ground-based detectors are now offline for the further upgrade, and we expect a significant increase in the detection rate in the next observational period. In addition, the preparations for the space-based GW observatory, LISA, have already started. The LISA data will
contain numerous GW signals of the same and of a different kind.
   The main goal of this project is to study the formation channel(s) of the detected population of binary
systems. This includes (i) study of the astrophysical models for the formation of binary systems,
(ii) identifying the characteristic features of each formation channel, and (iii) using Bayesian inference to assign a probability to each astrophysical hypothesis based on the detected population of binaries.
In addition, we want to study a possible violation of General Relativity (GR) Theory encoded in the GW
signal. The GR is well tested theory in the regimes of moderate and weak gravity, so we expect that any possible
deviations from GR would be small and might not be detectable in a single GW signal. We intend to use the population of detected signals to search for a common (weak) signs of violation of GR. We will apply the
developed methods to the catalogue of source detected by LIGO-VIRGO and to the simulated LISA data.

Responsable: 

S. Babak

Services/Groupes: 

Année: 

2018

Formations: 

Thèse

Niveau demandé: 

M2

Email du responsable: