Intrinsic selection biases of ground-based gravitational wave searches for high-mass black hole-black hole mergers

Journal Article · Mon Nov 15 04:00:00 EST 2010 · Physical Review. D, Particles Fields

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVD.82.104006· OSTI ID:21503620

O'Shaughnessy, R; Vaishnav, B; Healy, J; Shoemaker, D ^[1]

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1. Center for Gravitational Wave Physics, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802 (United States)

The next generation of ground-based gravitational wave detectors may detect a few mergers of comparable-mass M{approx_equal}100-1000M{sub {center_dot}}[''intermediate-mass'' (IMBH)] spinning black holes. Black hole spin is known to have a significant impact on the orbit, merger signal, and post-merger ringdown of any binary with non-negligible spin. In particular, the detection volume for spinning binaries depends significantly on the component black hole spins. We provide a fit to the single-detector and isotropic-network detection volume versus (total) mass and arbitrary spin for equal-mass binaries. Our analysis assumes matched filtering to all significant available waveform power (up to l=6 available for fitting, but only l{<=}4 significant) estimated by an array of 64 numerical simulations with component spins as large as S{sub 1,2}/M{sup 2{<=}}0.8. We provide a spin-dependent estimate of our uncertainty, up to S{sub 1,2}/M{sup 2{<=}}1. For the initial (advanced) LIGO detector, our fits are reliable for M(set-membership sign)[100,500]M{sub {center_dot}} (M(set-membership sign)[100,1600]M{sub {center_dot}}). In the online version of this article, we also provide fits assuming incomplete information, such as the neglect of higher-order harmonics. We briefly discuss how a strong selection bias towards aligned spins influences the interpretation of future gravitational wave detections of IMBH-IMBH mergers.

• OSTI ID: 21503620
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Journal Name: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields Journal Issue: 10 Vol. 82; ISSN PRVDAQ; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
ANGULAR MOMENTUM
BLACK HOLES
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
GRAVITATIONAL WAVE DETECTORS
GRAVITATIONAL WAVES
HARMONICS
MASS
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
ORBITS
OSCILLATIONS
PARTICLE PROPERTIES
RADIATION DETECTORS
SIMULATION
SPIN
WAVE FORMS