143 research outputs found

    Propagation of gamma rays and production of free electrons in air

    Full text link
    A new concept of remote detection of concealed radioactive materials has been recently proposed \cite{Gr.Nusin.2010}-\cite{NusinSprangle}. It is based on the breakdown in air at the focal point of a high-power beam of electromagnetic waves produced by a THz gyrotron. To initiate the avalanche breakdown, seed free electrons should be present in this focal region during the electromagnetic pulse. This paper is devoted to the analysis of production of free electrons by gamma rays leaking from radioactive materials. Within a hundred meters from the radiation source, the fluctuating free electrons appear with the rate that may exceed significantly the natural background ionization rate. During the gyrotron pulse of about 10 microsecond length, such electrons may seed the electric breakdown and create sufficiently dense plasma at the focal region to be detected as an unambiguous effect of the concealed radioactive material.Comment: 27 pages, 10 figure

    A Joint Fermi-GBM and Swift-BAT Analysis of Gravitational-wave Candidates from the Third Gravitational-wave Observing Run

    Get PDF
    We present Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (Fermi-GBM) and Swift Burst Alert Telescope (Swift-BAT) searches for gamma-ray/X-ray counterparts to gravitational-wave (GW) candidate events identified during the third observing run of the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo detectors. Using Fermi-GBM onboard triggers and subthreshold gamma-ray burst (GRB) candidates found in the Fermi-GBM ground analyses, the Targeted Search and the Untargeted Search, we investigate whether there are any coincident GRBs associated with the GWs. We also search the Swift-BAT rate data around the GW times to determine whether a GRB counterpart is present. No counterparts are found. Using both the Fermi-GBM Targeted Search and the Swift- BAT search, we calculate flux upper limits and present joint upper limits on the gamma-ray luminosity of each GW. Given these limits, we constrain theoretical models for the emission of gamma rays from binary black hole mergers

    Model-based cross-correlation search for gravitational waves from the low-mass X-ray binary Scorpius X-1 in LIGO O3 data

    Get PDF

    Constraints on the cosmic expansion history from GWTC-3

    Get PDF
    We use 47 gravitational-wave sources from the Third LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalog (GWTC-3) to estimate the Hubble parameter H(z)H(z), including its current value, the Hubble constant H0H_0. Each gravitational-wave (GW) signal provides the luminosity distance to the source and we estimate the corresponding redshift using two methods: the redshifted masses and a galaxy catalog. Using the binary black hole (BBH) redshifted masses, we simultaneously infer the source mass distribution and H(z)H(z). The source mass distribution displays a peak around 34M34\, {\rm M_\odot}, followed by a drop-off. Assuming this mass scale does not evolve with redshift results in a H(z)H(z) measurement, yielding H0=687+12kms1Mpc1H_0=68^{+12}_{-7} {\rm km\,s^{-1}\,Mpc^{-1}} (68%68\% credible interval) when combined with the H0H_0 measurement from GW170817 and its electromagnetic counterpart. This represents an improvement of 17% with respect to the H0H_0 estimate from GWTC-1. The second method associates each GW event with its probable host galaxy in the catalog GLADE+, statistically marginalizing over the redshifts of each event's potential hosts. Assuming a fixed BBH population, we estimate a value of H0=686+8kms1Mpc1H_0=68^{+8}_{-6} {\rm km\,s^{-1}\,Mpc^{-1}} with the galaxy catalog method, an improvement of 42% with respect to our GWTC-1 result and 20% with respect to recent H0H_0 studies using GWTC-2 events. However, we show that this result is strongly impacted by assumptions about the BBH source mass distribution; the only event which is not strongly impacted by such assumptions (and is thus informative about H0H_0) is the well-localized event GW190814

    First joint observation by the underground gravitational-wave detector KAGRA with GEO 600

    Get PDF
    We report the results of the first joint observation of the KAGRA detector with GEO 600. KAGRA is a cryogenic and underground gravitational-wave detector consisting of a laser interferometer with 3 km arms, located in Kamioka, Gifu, Japan. GEO 600 is a British-German laser interferometer with 600 m arms, located near Hannover, Germany. GEO 600 and KAGRA performed a joint observing run from April 7 to 20, 2020. We present the results of the joint analysis of the GEO-KAGRA data for transient gravitational-wave signals, including the coalescence of neutron-star binaries and generic unmodeled transients. We also perform dedicated searches for binary coalescence signals and generic transients associated with gamma-ray burst events observed during the joint run. No gravitational-wave events were identified. We evaluate the minimum detectable amplitude for various types of transient signals and the spacetime volume for which the network is sensitive to binary neutron-star coalescences. We also place lower limits on the distances to the gamma-ray bursts analyzed based on the non-detection of an associated gravitational-wave signal for several signal models, including binary coalescences. These analyses demonstrate the feasibility and utility of KAGRA as a member of the global gravitational-wave detector network

    Search for gravitational waves from Scorpius X-1 with a hidden Markov model in O3 LIGO data

    Get PDF

    Search for subsolar-mass black hole binaries in the second part of Advanced LIGO's and Advanced Virgo's third observing run

    Full text link
    We describe a search for gravitational waves from compact binaries with at least one component with mass 0.2 MM_\odot -- 1.0M1.0 M_\odot and mass ratio q0.1q \geq 0.1 in Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo data collected between 1 November 2019, 15:00 UTC and 27 March 2020, 17:00 UTC. No signals were detected. The most significant candidate has a false alarm rate of 0.2 yr1\mathrm{yr}^{-1}. We estimate the sensitivity of our search over the entirety of Advanced LIGO's and Advanced Virgo's third observing run, and present the most stringent limits to date on the merger rate of binary black holes with at least one subsolar-mass component. We use the upper limits to constrain two fiducial scenarios that could produce subsolar-mass black holes: primordial black holes (PBH) and a model of dissipative dark matter. The PBH model uses recent prescriptions for the merger rate of PBH binaries that include a rate suppression factor to effectively account for PBH early binary disruptions. If the PBHs are monochromatically distributed, we can exclude a dark matter fraction in PBHs fPBH0.6f_\mathrm{PBH} \gtrsim 0.6 (at 90% confidence) in the probed subsolar-mass range. However, if we allow for broad PBH mass distributions we are unable to rule out fPBH=1f_\mathrm{PBH} = 1. For the dissipative model, where the dark matter has chemistry that allows a small fraction to cool and collapse into black holes, we find an upper bound fDBH<105f_{\mathrm{DBH}} < 10^{-5} on the fraction of atomic dark matter collapsed into black holes.Comment: https://dcc.ligo.org/P220013

    Search for gravitational waves from Scorpius X-1 with a hidden Markov model in O3 LIGO data

    Get PDF
    Results are presented for a semi-coherent search for continuous gravitational waves from the low-mass X-ray binary Scorpius X-1, using a hidden Markov model (HMM) to allow for spin wandering. This search improves on previous HMM-based searches of Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) data by including the orbital period in the search template grid, and by analyzing data from the latest (third) observing run (O3). In the frequency range searched, from 60 to 500 Hz, we find no evidence of gravitational radiation. This is the most sensitive search for Scorpius X-1 using a HMM to date. For the most sensitive sub-band, starting at 256.06256.06Hz, we report an upper limit on gravitational wave strain (at 95%95 \% confidence) of h095%=6.16×1026h_{0}^{95\%}=6.16\times10^{-26}, assuming the orbital inclination angle takes its electromagnetically restricted value ι=44\iota=44^{\circ}. The upper limits on gravitational wave strain reported here are on average a factor of 3\sim 3 lower than in the O2 HMM search. This is the first Scorpius X-1 HMM search with upper limits that reach below the indirect torque-balance limit for certain sub-bands, assuming ι=44\iota=44^{\circ}

    Search for subsolar-mass black hole binaries in the second part of Advanced LIGO’s and Advanced Virgo’s third observing run

    Get PDF
    We describe a search for gravitational waves from compact binaries with at least one component with mass 0.2 M⊙–1.0 M⊙ and mass ratio q ≥ 0.1 in Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo data collected between 1 November 2019, 15:00 UTC and 27 March 2020, 17:00 UTC. No signals were detected. The most significant candidate has a false alarm rate of 0.2yr−1 ⁠. We estimate the sensitivity of our search over the entirety of Advanced LIGO’s and Advanced Virgo’s third observing run, and present the most stringent limits to date on the merger rate of binary black holes with at least one subsolar-mass component. We use the upper limits to constrain two fiducial scenarios that could produce subsolar-mass black holes: primordial black holes (PBH) and a model of dissipative dark matter. The PBH model uses recent prescriptions for the merger rate of PBH binaries that include a rate suppression factor to effectively account for PBH early binary disruptions. If the PBHs are monochromatically distributed, we can exclude a dark matter fraction in PBHs fPBH ≳ 0.6 (at 90% confidence) in the probed subsolar-mass range. However, if we allow for broad PBH mass distributions we are unable to rule out fPBH = 1. For the dissipative model, where the dark matter has chemistry that allows a small fraction to cool and collapse into black holes, we find an upper bound fDBH &lt; 10−5 on the fraction of atomic dark matter collapsed into black holes

    Model-based cross-correlation search for gravitational waves from the low-mass X-ray binary Scorpius X-1 in LIGO O3 data

    Get PDF
    We present the results of a model-based search for continuous gravitational waves from the low-mass X-ray binary Scorpius X-1 using LIGO detector data from the third observing run of Advanced LIGO, Advanced Virgo and KAGRA. This is a semicoherent search which uses details of the signal model to coherently combine data separated by less than a specified coherence time, which can be adjusted to balance sensitivity with computing cost. The search covered a range of gravitational-wave frequencies from 25Hz to 1600Hz, as well as ranges in orbital speed, frequency and phase determined from observational constraints. No significant detection candidates were found, and upper limits were set as a function of frequency. The most stringent limits, between 100Hz and 200Hz, correspond to an amplitude h0 of about 1e-25 when marginalized isotropically over the unknown inclination angle of the neutron star's rotation axis, or less than 4e-26 assuming the optimal orientation. The sensitivity of this search is now probing amplitudes predicted by models of torque balance equilibrium. For the usual conservative model assuming accretion at the surface of the neutron star, our isotropically-marginalized upper limits are close to the predicted amplitude from about 70Hz to 100Hz; the limits assuming the neutron star spin is aligned with the most likely orbital angular momentum are below the conservative torque balance predictions from 40Hz to 200Hz. Assuming a broader range of accretion models, our direct limits on gravitational-wave amplitude delve into the relevant parameter space over a wide range of frequencies, to 500Hz or more
    corecore