A time-domain MCMC search and upper limit technique for gravitational waves of uncertain frequency from a targeted neutron star

TL;DR

This paper introduces a time-domain MCMC Bayesian method to efficiently search for gravitational waves from uncertain frequency sources like neutron stars, enabling upper limit setting on signal amplitude.

Contribution

The paper develops a novel time-domain MCMC approach for gravitational wave searches over uncertain frequencies and spindown rates, improving computational efficiency.

Findings

Successfully performs Bayesian search over 4 Hz band and spindown range

Sets upper limits on gravitational wave amplitude using Monte Carlo simulations

Demonstrates feasibility for targeted neutron star searches

Abstract

It is computationally expensive to search the large parameter space associated with a gravitational wave signal of uncertain frequency, such as might be expected from the possible pulsar generated by SN1987A. To address this difficulty we have developed a Markov Chain Monte Carlo method that performs a time-domain Bayesian search for a signal over a 4 Hz frequency band and a spindown of magnitude of up to $1\ee{-9}$ Hz/s. We use Monte Carlo simulations to set upper limits on signal amplitude with this technique, which we intend to apply to a gravitational wave search.