Gravitational waves and the polarizations in Ho\v{r}ava gravity after GW170817

TL;DR

This paper investigates the polarization modes of gravitational waves in Hořava gravity, considering observational constraints from GW170817, and explores how pulsar timing and Gaia can detect scalar polarization signatures.

Contribution

It identifies the polarization modes in Hořava gravity using gauge-invariant variables and assesses their detectability with current observational tools under experimental constraints.

Findings

Hořava gravity predicts three polarization modes, including scalar modes with mixed polarizations.

Experimental constraints, especially from GW170817, strongly limit the parameter space of Hořava gravity.

Pulsar timing arrays and Gaia can potentially detect scalar polarization signatures in gravitational waves.

Abstract

The gravitational waves of Ho\v{r}ava gravity, their polarization states and their possible observational signatures are discussed. Using the gauge-invariant variable formalism, we found the three polarization modes in Ho\v{r}ava gravity excited by the three physical degrees of freedom contained in this theory. In particular, the scalar degree of freedom excites a mix of the transverse breathing and the longitudinal polarizations. The constraints from the previous experimental observations are taken into account, especially including the speed bound from the observations of GW170817 and GRB 170817A. It was found that Ho\v{r}ava theory is highly constrained. Within the experimentally allowed parametric space, we studied whether the pulsar timing arrays and the Gaia mission can be used to distinguish the different polarizations. After calculating the cross-correlation functions between the redshifts of photons and the astrometric positions of stars, one concludes that it is possible to tell whether there exits the scalar polarization using pulsar timing arrays and the Gaia mission.