Optimizing optical follow-up of gravitational-wave candidates

TL;DR

This paper introduces a coordinated planning framework to optimize optical follow-up observations of gravitational-wave events, significantly increasing detection efficiency by effectively utilizing multiple telescopes with varying capabilities.

Contribution

The paper proposes a novel scheme for coordinating multiple telescopes to maximize the probability of detecting optical counterparts to gravitational-wave signals, improving over independent observations.

Findings

Coordinated approach doubles detection efficiency.

Framework effectively manages telescopes with different fields of view.

Case study demonstrates practical benefits in real observing runs.

Abstract

Observations with interferometric gravitational-wave detectors result in probability sky maps that are multimodal and spread over 10-100 deg^2. We present a scheme for maximizing the probability of imaging optical counterparts to gravitational-wave transients given limited observing resources. Our framework is capable of coordinating many telescopes with different fields of view and limiting magnitudes. We present a case study comparing three different planning algorithms. We find that, with the network of telescopes that was used in the most recent joint LIGO-Virgo science run, a relatively straightforward coordinated approach doubles the detection efficiency relative to each telescope observing independently.