Parameter space metric for 3.5 post-Newtonian gravitational-waves from compact binary inspirals

TL;DR

This paper derives a parameter space metric for 3.5PN gravitational waveforms from compact binary inspirals, improving template placement and event detection efficiency in gravitational wave data analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a 3.5PN metric for waveform template placement, enhancing detection accuracy over the previous 2PN-based approach.

Findings

10% increase in recovered event rate

Nearly doubled number of templates needed

More accurate cross-correlation between mass parameters

Abstract

We derive the metric on the parameter space of 3.5 post-Newtonian (3.5PN) stationary phase compact binary inspiral waveforms for a single detector, neglecting spin, eccentricity, and finite-body effects. We demonstrate that this leads to better template placement than the current practice of using the 2PN metric to place 3.5PN templates: The recovered event rate is improved by about 10% at a cost of nearly doubling the number of templates. The cross-correlations between mass parameters are also more accurate, which will result in better coincidence tests.