A template bank to search for gravitational waves from inspiralling compact binaries I: physical models

TL;DR

This paper presents a template bank algorithm for gravitational wave searches from inspiralling compact binaries, demonstrating its efficiency across various detector sensitivities and binary types using Monte-Carlo simulations.

Contribution

It introduces a new template bank algorithm optimized for non-spinning compact binary signals, validated through simulations for multiple detector configurations.

Findings

The template bank performs efficiently for GEO 600, LIGO, and Virgo sensitivities.

It effectively detects various binary systems including black holes and neutron stars.

The algorithm ensures minimal signal-to-noise ratio loss due to template discreteness.

Abstract

Gravitational waves from coalescing compact binaries are searched using the matched filtering technique. As the model waveform depends on a number of parameters, it is necessary to filter the data through a template bank covering the astrophysically interesting region of the parameter space. The choice of templates is defined by the maximum allowed drop in signal-to-noise ratio due to the discreteness of the template bank. In this paper we describe the template-bank algorithm that was used in the analysis of data from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) and GEO 600 detectors to search for signals from binaries consisting of non-spinning compact objects. Using Monte-Carlo simulations, we study the efficiency of the bank and show that its performance is satisfactory for the design sensitivity curves of ground-based interferometric gravitational wave detectors GEO 600, initial LIGO, advanced LIGO and Virgo. The bank is efficient to search for various compact binaries such as binary primordial black holes, binary neutron stars, binary black holes, as well as a mixed binary consisting of a non-spinning black hole and a neutron star.