Source localizations with the network of space-based gravitational wave detectors

TL;DR

This paper investigates how a network of space-based gravitational wave detectors enhances sky localization accuracy, emphasizing the importance of detector plane angles and time delays, and analyzing factors influencing localization improvements.

Contribution

It identifies key factors like detector plane angles and time delays that significantly improve source localization in space-based GW detector networks.

Findings

Detector plane angles dominate localization improvement.

Time delay is the second most important factor.

Network benefits are greater for signals with higher SNR contributions from small parts.

Abstract

The sky localization of the gravitational wave (GW) source is an important scientific objective for GW observations. A network of space-based GW detectors dramatically improves the sky localization accuracy compared with an individual detector not only in the inspiral stage but also in the ringdown stage. It is interesting to explore what plays an important role in the improvement. We find that the angle between the detector planes dominates the improvement, and the time delay is the next important factor. A detector network can dramatically improve the source localization for short signals and long signals with most contributions to the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) coming from a small part of the signal in a short time, and the more SNR contributed by smaller parts, the better improvement by the network. We also find the effects of the arm length in the transfer function and higher harmonics are negligible for source localization with the detector network.