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DOE OSTI2024

Could a Kilonova Kill: A Threat Assessment

Abstract Binary neutron star mergers produce high-energy emissions from several physically different sources, including a gamma-ray burst (GRB) and its afterglow, a kilonova (KN), and, at late times, a remnant many parsecs in size. Ionizing radiation from these sources can be dangerous for life on Earth-like planets when located too close. Work to date has explored the substantial danger posed by the GRB to on-axis observers; here we focus instead on the potential threats posed to nearby off-axis observers. Our analysis is based largely on observations of the GW170817/GRB 170817A multi-messenger event, as well as theoretical predictions. For baseline KN parameters, we find that the X-ray emission from the afterglow may be lethal out to ∼1 pc and the off-axis gamma-ray emission may threaten a range out to ∼4 pc, whereas the greatest threat comes years after the explosion, from the cosmic rays accelerated by the KN blast, which can be lethal out to distances up to ∼11 pc. The distances quoted here are typical, but the values have significant uncertainties and depend on the viewing angle, ejected mass, and explosion energy in ways we quantify. Assessing the overall threat to Earth-like planets, KNe have a similar kill distance to supernovae, but are far less common. However, our results rely on the scant available KN data, and multi-messenger observations will clarify the danger posed by such events.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗

DOE OSTI2023

Applications of Deep Learning to physics workflows

Modern large-scale physics experiments create datasets with sizes and streaming rates that can exceed those from industry leaders such as Google Cloud and Netflix. Fully processing these datasets requires both sufficient compute power and efficient workflows. Recent advances in Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can either improve or replace existing domain-specific algorithms to increase workflow efficiency. Not only can these algorithms improve the physics performance of current algorithms, but they can often be executed more quickly, especially when run on coprocessors such as GPUs or FPGAs. In the winter of 2023, MIT hosted the Accelerating Physics with ML at MIT workshop, which brought together researchers from gravitational-wave physics, multi-messenger astrophysics, and particle physics to discuss and share current efforts to integrate ML tools into their workflows. The following white paper highlights examples of algorithms and computing frameworks discussed during this workshop and summarizes the expected computing needs for the immediate future of the involved fields.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

DOE OSTI2022

RTN-008: Rubin Observatory Processing of Gravitational Wave TOO Data in the Early Operations Era

Since the watershed discovery of an electromagnetic counterpart to the LIGO/VIRGO gravitational wave source GW170817, multi-messenger astrophysics has emerged as a major area of strategic focus for the NSF. Rubin Observatory’s depth, survey speed, and data management systems will make it a key asset in the search for EM counterparts. Exploiting this capability during the phases of Rubin commissioning and early operations that coincide with GW observing run O4 may require special actions, however. We discuss potential approaches to data access, template building, and special data processing.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2022

Exploring the MeV sky with a combined coded mask and Compton telescope: the Galactic Explorer with a Coded aperture mask Compton telescope (GECCO)

The sky at MeV energies is currently poorly explored. Here we present an innovative mission concept that builds upon the heritage of past and current missions improving the sensitivity and, very importantly, the angular resolution. This consists in combining a Compton telescope and a coded-mask telescope. We delineate the motivation for such a concept and we define the scientific goals for such a mission. The Galactic Explorer with a Coded Aperture Mask Compton Telescope (GECCO) is a novel concept for a next-generation telescope covering hard X-ray and soft gamma-ray energies. The potential and importance of this approach that bridges the observational gap in the MeV energy range are presented. With the unprecedented angular resolution of the coded mask telescope combined with the sensitive Compton telescope, a mission such as GECCO can disentangle the discrete sources from the truly diffuse emission. Individual Galactic and extragalactic sources are detected. This also allows to understand the gamma-ray Galactic center excess and the Fermi Bubbles, and to trace the low-energy cosmic rays, and their propagation in the Galaxy. Nuclear and annihilation lines are spatially and spectrally resolved from the continuum emission and from sources, addressing the role of low-energy cosmic rays in star formation and galaxy evolution, the origin of the 511 keV positron line, fundamental physics, and the chemical enrichment in the Galaxy. Such an instrument also detects explosive transient gamma-ray sources, which, in turn, enables identifying and studying the astrophysical objects that produce gravitational waves and neutrinos in a multi-messenger context. By looking at a poorly explored energy band it also allows discoveries of new astrophysical phenomena.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2026

Constraining Hamiltonians from chiral effective field theory with neutron-star data

Multi-messenger observations of neutron stars (NSs) and their mergers have placed strong constraints on the dense-matter equation of state (EOS). The EOS, in turn, depends on microscopic nuclear interactions that are described by nuclear Hamiltonians. These Hamiltonians are commonly derived within chiral effective field theory (EFT). Ideally, multi-messenger observations of NSs could be used to directly inform our understanding of EFT interactions, but such a direct inference necessitates millions of model evaluations. This is computationally prohibitive because each evaluation requires us to calculate the EOS from a Hamiltonian by solving the quantum many-body problem with methods such as auxiliary-field diffusion Monte Carlo (AFDMC), which provides very accurate and precise solutions but at a significant computational cost. Additionally, we need to solve the stellar structure equations for each EOS which further slows down each model evaluation by a few seconds. In this work, we combine emulators for AFDMC calculations of neutron matter, built using parametric matrix models, and for the stellar structure equations, built using multilayer perceptron neural networks, with the PyCBC data-analysis framework to enable a direct inference of coupling constants in an EFT Hamiltonian using multi-messenger observations of NSs. We find that astrophysical data can provide informative constraints on two-nucleon couplings despite the high densities probed in NS interiors.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2023

The high energy X-ray probe (HEX-P): Galactic PeVatrons, star clusters, superbubbles, microquasar jets, and gamma-ray binaries

HEX-P is a probe-class mission concept that will combine high spatial resolution X-ray imaging (<10" FWHM) and broad spectral coverage (0.2–80 keV) with an effective area far superior to current facilities (including XMM-Newton and NuSTAR) to enable revolutionary new insights into a variety of important astrophysical problems. With the recent discoveries of over 40 ultra-high-energy gamma-ray sources (detected above 100 TeV) and neutrino emission in the Galactic Plane, we have entered a new era of multi-messenger astrophysics facing the exciting reality of Galactic PeVatrons. In the next decade, as more Galactic PeVatrons and TeV gamma-ray sources are expected to be discovered, the identification of their acceleration and emission mechanisms will be the most pressing issue in both particle and high-energy astrophysics. In this paper, along with its companion papers, we will present that HEX-P is uniquely suited to address important problems in various cosmic-ray accelerators, including Galactic PeVatrons, through investigating synchrotron X-ray emission of TeV–PeV electrons produced by both leptonic and hadronic processes. For Galactic PeVatron candidates and other TeV gamma-ray sources, HEX-P can fill in a large gap in the spectral-energy distributions (SEDs) of many objects observed in radio, soft X-rays, and gamma rays, constraining the maximum energies to which electrons can be accelerated, with implications for the nature of the Galactic PeVatrons and their contributions to the spectrum of Galactic cosmic rays beyond the knee at ~3 PeV. In particular, X-ray observation with HEX-P and TeV observation with CTAO will provide the most powerful multi-messenger diagnostics to identify Galactic PeVatrons and explore a variety of astrophysical shock mechanisms. We present simulations of each class of Galactic TeV–PeV sources, demonstrating the power of both the imaging and spectral capabilities of HEX-P to advance our knowledge of Galactic cosmic-ray accelerators. In addition, we discuss HEX-P’s unique and complementary roles to upcoming gamma-ray and neutrino observatories in the 2030s.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2023

The high energy X-ray probe (HEX-P): Galactic PeVatrons, star clusters, superbubbles, microquasar jets, and gamma-ray binaries

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2024

Bayesian inference of multi-messenger astrophysical data: Joint and coherent inference of gravitational waves and kilonovae

Multi-messenger observations of binary neutron star mergers can provide information on the neutron star’s equation of state (EOS) above the nuclear saturation density by directly constraining the mass-radius diagram. We present a Bayesian framework for joint and coherent analyses of multi-messenger binary neutron star signals. As a first application, we analyze the gravitational-wave GW170817 and the kilonova (kN) AT2017gfo data. These results are then combined with the most recent X-ray pulsar analyses of PSR J0030+0451 and PSR J0740+6620 to obtain new EOS constraints.We extend the bajes infrastructure with a joint likelihood for multiple datasets, support for various semi-analytical kN models, and numerical-relativity (NR)-informed relations for the mass ejecta, as well as a technique to include and marginalize over modeling uncertainties. The analysis of GW170817 used the TEOBResumS effective-one-body waveform template to model the gravitational-wave signal. The analysis of AT2017gfo used a baseline multicomponent spherically symmetric model for the kN light curves. Various constraints on the mass-radius diagram and neutron star properties were then obtained by resampling over a set of ten million parameterized EOSs, which was built under minimal assumptions (general relativity and causality).

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2023

An updated nuclear-physics and multi-messenger astrophysics framework for binary neutron star mergers

The multi-messenger detection of the gravitational-wave signal GW170817, the corresponding kilonova AT2017gfo and the short gamma-ray burst GRB170817A, as well as the observed afterglow has delivered a scientific breakthrough. For an accurate interpretation of all these different messengers, one requires robust theoretical models that describe the emitted gravitational-wave, the electromagnetic emission, and dense matter reliably. In addition, one needs efficient and accurate computational tools to ensure a correct cross-correlation between the models and the observational data. For this purpose, we have developed the Nuclear-physics and Multi-Messenger Astrophysics framework NMMA. The code allows incorporation of nuclear-physics constraints at low densities as well as X-ray and radio observations of isolated neutron stars. In previous works, the NMMA code has allowed us to constrain the equation of state of supranuclear dense matter, to measure the Hubble constant, and to compare dense-matter physics probed in neutron-star mergers and in heavy-ion collisions, and to classify electromagnetic observations and perform model selection. Here, we show an extension of the NMMA code as a first attempt of analyzing the gravitational-wave signal, the kilonova, and the gamma-ray burst afterglow simultaneously. Incorporating all available information, we estimate the radius of a 1.4M ⊙ neutron star to be $R$ $=$ $11.98^{+0.35}_{-0.04}$ km.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2023

Measuring the Hubble Constant with Dark Neutron Star–Black Hole Mergers

Abstract Detection of gravitational waves (GWs) from neutron star-black hole (NSBH) standard sirens provides local measurements of the Hubble constant (H 0 ), regardless of the detection of an electromagnetic (EM) counterpart, given that matter effects can be exploited to break the redshift degeneracy of the GW waveforms. The distinctive merger morphology and the high-redshift detectability of tidally disrupted NSBH make them promising candidates for this method. Also, the detection prospects of an EM counterpart for these systems will be limited toz< 0.8 in the optical, in the era of future GW detectors. Using recent constraints on the equation of state of NSs from multi-messenger observations of NICER and LIGO/Virgo/KAGRA, we show the prospects of measuringH 0 solely from GW observation of NSBH systems, achievable by the Einstein telescope (ET) and Cosmic Explorer (CE) detectors. We first analyze individual events to quantify the effect of high-frequency (≥500 Hz) tidal distortions on the inference of NS tidal deformability parameter (Λ) and hence onH 0 . We find that disruptive mergers can constrain Λ up to  ( 60 % ) more precisely than nondisruptive ones. However, this precision is not sufficient to place stringent constraints on theH 0 from individual events. By performing Bayesian analysis on simulated NSBH data (up toN= 100 events, corresponding to a day of observation) in the ET+CE detectors, we find that NSBH systems enable unbiased 4%–13% precision on the estimate ofH 0 (68% credible interval). This is a similar measurement precision found in studies analyzing NSBH mergers with EM counterparts in the LVKC O5 era.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗

DOE OSTI2021

Development of a cosmic ray oriented trigger for the fluorescence telescope on EUSO-SPB2

The Extreme Universe Space Observatory on a Super Pressure Balloon 2 (EUSO-SPB2), in preparation, aims to make the first observations of Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs) from near space using optical techniques. EUSO-SPB2 will prototype instrumentation for future satellite-based missions, including the Probe of Extreme Multi-Messenger Astrophysics (POEMMA) and K-EUSO. The payload will consist of two telescopes. The first is a Cherenkov telescope (CT) being developed to quantify the background for future below-the-limb very high energy (E 10 PeV) astrophysical neutrino observations, and the second is a fluorescence telescope (FT) being developed for detection of UHECRs. The FT will consist of a Schmidt telescope, and a 6192 pixel ultraviolet camera with an integration time of 1.05 s. The first step in the data acquisition process for the FT is a hardware level trigger in order to decide which data to record. In order to maximize the number of UHECR induced extensive air showers (EASs) which can be detected, a novel trigger algorithm has been developed based on the intricacies and limitations of the detector. Finally, the expected performance of the trigger has been characterized by simulations and, pending hardware verification, shows that EUSO-SPB2 is well positioned to attempt the first near-space observation of UHECRs via optical techniques.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Inferring three-nucleon couplings from multi-messenger neutron-star observations

Understanding the interactions between nucleons in dense matter is an important challenge in theoretical physics. Effective field theories have emerged as the dominant approach to address this problem at low energies, with many successful applications to the structure of nuclei and the properties of dense nucleonic matter. However, how far into the interior of neutron stars these interactions can describe dense matter is an open question. Here, we develop a framework that enables the inference of three-nucleon couplings in dense matter directly from astrophysical neutron star observations. We apply this formalism to the LIGO/Virgo gravitational-wave event GW170817 and the X-ray measurements from NASA’s Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer and establish direct constraints for the couplings that govern three-nucleon interactions in chiral effective field theory. Furthermore, we demonstrate how next-generation observations of a population of neutron star mergers can offer stringent constraints on three-nucleon couplings, potentially at a level comparable to those from laboratory data. Our work directly connects the microscopic couplings in quantum field theories to macroscopic observations of neutron stars, providing a way to test the consistency between low-energy couplings inferred from terrestrial and astrophysical data.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2024

Two-moment Neutrino Flavor Transformation with Applications to the Fast Flavor Instability in Neutron Star Mergers

Abstract Multi-messenger astrophysics has produced a wealth of data with much more to come in the future. This enormous data set will reveal new insights into the physics of core-collapse supernovae, neutron star mergers, and many other objects where it is actually possible, if not probable, that new physics is in operation. To tease out different possibilities, we will need to analyze signals from photons, neutrinos, gravitational waves, and chemical elements. This task is made all the more difficult when it is necessary to evolve the neutrino component of the radiation field and associated quantum-mechanical property of flavor in order to model the astrophysical system of interest—a numerical challenge that has not been addressed to this day. In this work, we take a step in this direction by adopting the technique of angular-integrated moments with a truncated tower of dynamical equations and a closure, convolving the flavor-transformation with spatial transport to evolve the neutrino radiation quantum field. We show that moments capture the dynamical features of fast flavor instabilities in a variety of systems, although our technique is by no means a universal blueprint for solving fast flavor transformation. To evaluate the effectiveness of our moment results, we compare to a more precise particle-in-cell method. Based on our results, we propose areas for improvement and application to complementary techniques in the future.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗

DOE OSTI2024

Birefringence tests of gravity with multimessenger binaries

Extensions to General Relativity (GR) allow the polarization of gravitational waves (GW) from astrophysical sources to suffer from amplitude and velocity birefringence, which respectively induce changes in the ellipticity and orientation of the polarization tensor. Here, we introduce a multi-messenger approach to test this polarization behavior of GWs during their cosmological propagation using binary sources, for which the initial polarization is determined by the inclination and orientation angles of the orbital angular momentum vector with respect to the line of sight. In particular, we use spatially resolved radio imaging of the jet from a binary neutron star (BNS) merger to constrain the orientation angle and hence the emitted polarization orientation of the GW signal at the site of the merger, and compare to that observed on Earth by GW detectors. For GW170817, using past measurements of the inclination angle, we constrain the deviation from GR due to amplitude birefringence to κ A = $-0.12^{+0.60}_ {-0.61}$, while the velocity birefringence parameter κ V remains unconstrained. The inability to constrain κ V is due to the low amplitude of GW170817 in the Virgo detector, and measurements of the polarization orientation require information from a combination of multiple detectors with different alignments. For this reason, we also mock future BNS mergers with resolved afterglow proper motion and project that κ V could be constrained to a precision of 5 rad (corresponding to an angular shift of the GW polarization of δ φV ≈ 0.2 rad for a BNS at 100 Mpc) by a future network of third-generation ground-based GW detectors such as Cosmic Explorer and the radio High Sensitivity Array. Crucially, this velocity birefringence effect cannot be constrained with dark binary mergers as it requires polarization information at the emission time, which can be provided only by electromagnetic emission.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

The La Silla Schmidt Southern Survey

We present the La Silla Schmidt Southern Survey (LS4), a new wide-field, time-domain survey to be conducted with the 1 m ESO Schmidt telescope. The 268 megapixel LS4 camera mosaics 32 2k × 4k fully depleted CCDs, providing a ∼20 deg 2 field of view with 1″ pixel −1 resolution. The LS4 camera will have excellent performance at longer wavelengths: in a standard 45 s exposure the expected 5σ limiting magnitudes in g, i, z are ∼21.5, ∼20.9, and ∼20.3 mag (AB), respectively. The telescope design requires a novel filter holder that fixes different bandpasses over each quadrant of the detector. Two quadrants will have i band, while the other two will be g and z band with color information obtained by dithering targets across the different quadrants. The majority (90%) of the observing time will be used to conduct a public survey that monitors the extragalactic sky at both moderate (3 days) and high (1 day) cadence, as well as focused observations within the Galactic plane and bulge. Alerts from the public survey will be broadcast to the community via established alert brokers. LS4 will run concurrently with the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). The combination of LS4+LSST will enable detailed holistic monitoring of many nearby transients: high-cadence LS4 observations will resolve the initial rise and peak of the light curve while less-frequent but deeper observations by LSST will characterize the years before and after explosion. Here, we summarize the primary science objectives of LS4 including microlensing events in the Galaxy, extragalactic transients powered by massive black holes or stellar explosions, the search for electromagnetic counterparts to multi-messenger events, and supernova cosmology.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2022

HAWC Study of the Ultra-high-energy Spectrum of MGRO J1908+06

We report TeV gamma-ray observations of the ultra-high-energy source MGRO J1908+06 using data from the High Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory. This source is one of the highest-energy known gamma-ray sources, with emission extending past 200 TeV. Modeling suggests that the bulk of the TeV gamma-ray emission is leptonic in nature, driven by the energetic radio-faint pulsar PSR J1907+0602. Depending on what assumptions are included in the model, a hadronic component may also be allowed. Using the results of the modeling, we discuss implications for detection prospects by multi-messenger campaigns.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2026

Multiscale and multidimensional modeling of particle acceleration and transport in solar flares

Multi-messenger, multi-viewpoint, and time-resolved observations of solar flares are now providing unprecedented constraints on particle acceleration sites, energy conversion, and energy transport. The interpretation of current observations, including microwave imaging spectroscopy from EOVSA, hard x-ray (HXR) imaging from Solar Orbiter/STIX, gamma-ray diagnostics from Fermi, and in situ measurements from Parker Solar Probe and Solar Orbiter, collectively demands modeling frameworks that go beyond traditional spatially unresolved, one-zone models or single-mechanism descriptions. This review surveys multiscale and multidimensional modeling approaches, including kinetic, magnetohydrodynamic (MHD), and macroscopic particle models, that are being developed to meet the need. Kinetic simulations reveal that three-dimensional (3D) effects, including field-line chaos and self-generated turbulence, are essential for sustained power-law particle acceleration. MHD simulations now capture flux-rope eruptions, plasmoid-unstable current sheets, and turbulent flare regions in realistic magnetic topologies. Macroscopic models coupling MHD with energetic-particle models produce spatially resolved electron distributions and synthetic HXR and microwave emissions for direct comparison with observations. Despite these advances, outstanding challenges remain in bridging kinetic and global scales, improving MHD simulations and macroscopic particle models, and achieving quantitative model-observation closure.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2023

Modelling populations of kilonovae

Abstract The 2017 detection of a kilonova coincident with gravitational-wave emission has identified neutron star mergers as the major source of the heaviest elements and dramatically constrained alternative theories of gravity. Observing a population of such sources has the potential to transform cosmology, nuclear physics, and astrophysics. However, with only one confident multi-messenger detection currently available, modelling the diversity of signals expected from such a population requires improved theoretical understanding. In particular, models that are quick to evaluate and are calibrated with more detailed multi-physics simulations are needed to design observational strategies for kilonovae detection and to obtain rapid-response interpretations of new observations. We use grey-opacity models to construct populations of kilonovae, spanning ejecta parameters predicted by numerical simulations. Our modelling focuses on wavelengths relevant for upcoming optical surveys, such as the Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). In these simulations, we implement heating rates that are based on nuclear reaction network calculations. We create a Gaussian-process emulator for kilonova grey opacities, calibrated with detailed radiative transfer simulations. Using recent fits to numerical relativity simulations, we predict how the ejecta parameters from binary neutron star (BNS) mergers shape the population of kilonovae, accounting for the viewing-angle dependence. Our simulated population of BNS mergers produce peak i-band absolute magnitudes of −20 ≤ Mi ≤ −11. A comparison with detailed radiative transfer calculations indicates that further improvements are needed to accurately reproduce spectral shapes over the full light curve evolution.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗