Accuracy of source localization for eccentric inspiraling binary mergers using a ground-based detector network

TL;DR

This study investigates how binary eccentricity affects the accuracy of gravitational wave source localization using ground-based detectors, finding significant improvements for high-mass binaries but negligible or negative effects for low-mass binaries.

Contribution

It demonstrates the impact of eccentricity on localization accuracy across different binary masses using the enhanced postcircular waveform model and Fisher matrix analysis.

Findings

Localization accuracy improves with more detectors.

High-mass binaries see significant accuracy gains with increased eccentricity.

Low-mass binaries show negligible or negative effects from eccentricity.

Abstract

The problem of gravitational wave parameter estimation and source localization is crucial in gravitational wave astronomy. Gravitational waves emitted by compact binary coalescences in the sensitivity band of second-generation ground-based detectors could have non-negligible eccentricities. Thus it is an interesting topic to study how the eccentricity of a binary source affects and improves the accuracy of its localization (and the signal-to-noise ratio). In this work we continue to investigate this effect with the enhanced postcircular waveform model. Using the Fisher information matrix method, we determine the accuracy of source localization with three ground-based detector networks. As expected, the accuracy of source localization is improved considerably with more detectors in a network. We find that the accuracy also increases significantly by increasing the eccentricity for the large total mass ($M\ge 40M_\odot$) binaries with all three networks. For the small total mass ($M<40 M_\odot$) binaries, this effect is negligible. For the smaller total mass ($M<5 M_\odot$) binaries, the accuracy could be even worse at some orientations with increasing eccentricity. This phenomenon comes mainly from how well the frequency of the higher harmonic modes induced by increasing eccentricity coincides with the sensitive bandwidth of the detectors. For the case of the $100 M_\odot$ black hole binary, the improvement factor is about $2$ in general when the eccentricity grows from $0.0$ to $0.4$. For the cases of the $22 M_\odot$ black hole binary and the $2.74 M_\odot$ neutron star binary, the improvement factor is less than $1.1$, and it may be less than 1 at some orientations.