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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 685 records · Page 38
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2015

High-Energy Electromagnetic Offline Follow-Up of Ligo-Virgo Gravitational-Wave Binary Coalescence Candidate Events

We present two different search methods for electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational-wave (GW) events from ground-based detectors using archival NASA high-energy data from the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) and RXTE All-sky Monitor (ASM) instruments. To demonstrate the methods, we use a limited number of representative GW background noise events produced by a search for binary neutron star coalescence over the last two months of the LIGO-Virgo S6/VSR3 joint science run. Time and sky location provided by the GW data trigger a targeted search in the high-energy photon data. We use two custom pipelines: one to search for prompt gamma-ray counterparts in GBM, and the other to search for a variety of X-ray afterglow model signals in ASM. We measure the efficiency of the joint pipelines to weak gamma-ray burst counterparts, and a family of model X-ray afterglows. By requiring a detectable signal in either electromagnetic instrument coincident with a GW event, we are able to reject a large majority of GW candidates. This reduces the signal-to-noise ratio of the loudest surviving GW background event by around 15-20 percent.

gamma-ray burst: general↗
NASA NTRS2016

Galaxy Strategy for Ligo-Virgo Gravitational Wave Counterpart Searches

In this work we continue a line of inquiry begun in Kanner et al. which detailed a strategy for utilizing telescopes with narrow fields of view, such as the Swift X-Ray Telescope (XRT), to localize gravity wave (GW) triggers from LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) / Virgo. If one considers the brightest galaxies that produce 50 percent of the light, then the number of galaxies inside typical GW error boxes will be several tens. We have found that this result applies both in the early years of Advanced LIGO when the range is small and the error boxes large, and in the later years when the error boxes will be small and the range large. This strategy has the beneficial property of reducing the number of telescope pointings by a factor 10 to 100 compared with tiling the entire error box. Additional galaxy count reduction will come from a GW rapid distance estimate which will restrict the radial slice in search volume. Combining the bright galaxy strategy with a convolution based on anticipated GW localizations, we find that the searches can be restricted to about 18 plus or minus 5 galaxies for 2015, about 23 plus or minus 4 for 2017, and about 11 plus or minus for 2020. This assumes a distance localization at the putative neutron star-neutron star (NS-NS) merger range mu for each target year, and these totals are integrated out to the range. Integrating out to the horizon would roughly double the totals. For localizations with r (rotation) greatly less than mu the totals would decrease. The galaxy strategy we present in this work will enable numerous sensitive optical and X-ray telescopes with small fields of view to participate meaningfully in searches wherein the prospects for rapidly fading afterglow place a premium on a fast response time.

galaxies: statistics aEuro" gamma-ray burst: gener↗
NASA NTRS2016

Application of Compressive Sensing to Gravitational Microlensing Data and Implications for Miniaturized Space Observatories

Compressive Sensing is a technique for simultaneous acquisition and compression of data that is sparse or can be made sparse in some domain. It is currently under intense development and has been profitably employed for industrial and medical applications. We here describe the use of this technique for the processing of astronomical data. We outline the procedure as applied to exoplanet gravitational microlensing and analyze measurement results and uncertainty values. We describe implications for on-spacecraft data processing for space observatories. Our findings suggest that application of these techniques may yield significant, enabling benefits especially for power and volume-limited space applications such as miniaturized or micro-constellation satellites.

Gravitational Microlensing↗
NASA NTRS2016

Application of Compressive Sensing to Gravitational Microlensing Experiments

Compressive Sensing is an emerging technology for data compression and simultaneous data acquisition. This is an enabling technique for significant reduction in data bandwidth, and transmission power and hence, can greatly benefit spaceflight instruments. We apply this process to detect exoplanets via gravitational microlensing. We experiment with various impact parameters that describe microlensing curves to determine the effectiveness and uncertainty caused by Compressive Sensing. Finally, we describe implications for spaceflight missions.

Compressive Sensing↗
NASA NTRS2016

Application of Compressive Sensing to Gravitational Microlensing Data and Implications for Miniaturized Space Observatories

Compressive Sensing is a technique for simultaneous acquisition and compression of data that is sparse or can be made sparse in some domain. It is currently under intense development and has been profitably employed for industrial and medical applications. We here describe the use of this technique for the processing of astronomical data. We outline the procedure as applied to exoplanet gravitational microlensing and analyze measurement results and uncertainty values. We describe implications for on-spacecraft data processing for space observatories. Our findings suggest that application of these techniques may yield significant, enabling benefits especially for power and volume-limited space applications such as miniaturized or micro-constellation satellites.

Compressive Sensing↗
NASA NTRS2017

Stochastic Template Bank for Gravitational Wave Searches for Precessing Neutron Star-Black Hole Coalescence Events

Gravitational wave searches to date have largely focused on non-precessing systems. Including precession effects greatly increases the number of templates to be searched over. This leads to a corresponding increase in the computational cost and can increase the false alarm rate of a realistic search. On the other hand, there might be astrophysical systems that are entirely missed by non-precessing searches. In this paper we consider the problem of constructing a template bank using stochastic methods for neutron star-black hole binaries allowing for precession, but with the restrictions that the total angular momentum of the binary is pointing toward the detector and that the neutron star spin is negligible relative to that of the black hole. We quantify the number of templates required for the search, and we explicitly construct the template bank. We show that despite the large number of templates, stochastic methods can be adapted to solve the problem. We quantify the parameter space region over which the non-precessing search might miss signals.

gravitational wave↗
NASA NTRS2016

A Dark Energy Camera Search for an Optical Counterpart to the First Advanced LIGO Gravitational Wave Event GW150914

We report the results of a deep search for an optical counterpart to the gravitational wave (GW) event GW150914, the first trigger from the Advanced LIGO GW detectors. We used the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) to image a 102 deg(exp 2) area, corresponding to 38% of the initial trigger high-probability sky region and to 11% of the revised high-probability region. We observed in the i and z bands at 4-5, 7, and 24 days after the trigger. The median 5(sigma) point-source limiting magnitudes of our search images are i = 22.5 and z = 21.8 mag. We processed the images through a difference-imaging pipeline using templates from pre-existing Dark Energy Survey data and publicly available DECam data. Due to missing template observations and other losses, our effective search area subtends 40 deg(exp 2), corresponding to a 12% total probability in the initial map and 3% in the final map. In this area, we search for objects that decline significantly between days 4-5 and day 7, and are undetectable by day 24, finding none to typical magnitude limits of i = 21.5, 21.1, 20.1 for object colors (i-z)= 1, 0, -1, respectively. Our search demonstrates the feasibility of a dedicated search program with DECam and bodes well for future research in this emerging field.

binaries: close – catalogs – gravitational wav↗
NASA NTRS2017

Promise and Progress of Millihertz Gravitational-Wave Astronomy

Extending the new field of gravitational wave (GW) astronomy into the millihertz band with a space-based GW observatory is a high-priority objective of international astronomy community. This paper summarizes the astrophysical promise and the technological groundwork for such an observatory, concretely focusing on the prospects for the proposed Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) mission concept.

gravitational wave (GW) astronomy↗
NASA NTRS2018

Gravitational Wave Sources as Timing References for LISA Data

In the megahertz gravitational-wave band, galactic ultra-compact binaries (UCBs) are continuous sources emitting at near-constant frequency. The signals from many of these galactic binaries will be sufficiently strong to be detectable by the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) after approximately Omicron (1 week) of observing. In addition to their astrophysical value, these UCBs can be used to monitor the data quality of the observatory. This paper demonstrates the capabilities of galactic UCBs to be used as calibration sources for LISA by demanding signal coherence between adjacent week-long data segments separated by a gap in time of a priori unknown duration. A parameter for the gap duration is added to the UCB waveform model and used in a Markov-chain Monte Carlo algorithm simultaneously fitting for the astrophysical source parameters. Results from measurements of several UCBs are combined to produce a joint posterior on the gap duration. The measurement accuracy's dependence on how much is known about the UCBs through prior observing, and seasonal variations due to the LISA orbital motion, is quantified. The duration of data gaps in a two-week segment of data can be constrained to within approximately 0.2 s using Omicron (10) UCBs after one month of observing. The timing accuracy from UCBs improves to approximately or less than o.1 s after 1 year of mission operations. These results are robust to within a factor of approximately 2 when taking into account seasonal variations.

Gravitation Wave Sources↗
NASA NTRS2002

The Cassini Gravitational Wave Experiment

Doppler tracking experiments using the earth and a distant spacecraft as separated test masses have been used for gravitational wave searches in the low-frequency band. Here we describe the experiment, including the transfer functions of the signals and noises to the Doppler observable, and present the noise statistics and compare them with the pre-experiment noise budget.

gravitational↗
NASA NTRS1996

Interstellar Broadening of Images in the Gravitational Lens PKS 1830-211

The remarkably strong radio gravitational lens PKS 1830-211 consists of a one arcsecond diameter Einstein ring with two bright compact (milliarcsecond) components located on opposite sides of the ring. We have obtained 22GHz VLBA data on this source to determine the intrinsic angular sizes of the compact components.

galaxies↗
NASA NTRS2022

Application of Compressive Sensing for Gravitational Microlensing Events

Compressive sensing is a novel mathematical technique for simultaneous data acquisition and compression. This technique is particularly apt for time-series photometric measurements. In this work we apply compressive sensing to time-series photometric measurements specifically obtained due to gravitational microlensing events. We show through simulation modelling the error sensitivity for detecting microlensing event parameters. Particularly, we show the relation of the amount of error and its impact on the microlensing parameters of interest. We derive statistical error bounds to apply those as a baseline for analyzing the effectiveness of compressive sensing application. Our results conclude that for single and binary microlensing events we can obtain error less than 1% over a 3-pixel radius of the center of the microlensing star by using 25% Nyquist rate measurements.

Compressive Sensing↗
NASA NTRS2021

DDOTI Observations of Gravitational-Wave Sources Discovered in O3

We present optical follow-up observations with the Deca-Degree Optical Transient Imager (DDOTI) telescope of gravitational-wave (GW) events detected during the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo O3 observing run. DDOTI is capable of responding to an alert in a few minutes, has an instantaneous field of about 69 deg2, and obtains 10σ upper limits of wlim = 18.5–20.5 AB mag in 1000 s of exposure, depending on the conditions. We observed 54 per cent (26 out of 48) of the unretracted GW alerts and did not find any electromagnetic counterparts. We compare our upper limits to various possible counterparts: the kilonova AT 2017gfo, models of radioactive- and magnetar-powered kilonovae, short gamma-ray burst afterglows, and active galactic nucleus (AGN) flares. Although the large positional uncertainties of GW sources do not allow us to place strong constraints during O3, DDOTI observations of well-localized GW events in O4 and beyond could meaningfully constrain models of compact binary mergers. We show that DDOTI is able to detect kilonovae similar to AT 2017gfo up to about 200 Mpc and magnetar-powered kilonovae up to 1 Gpc. We calculate that nearby (≲200 Mpc) afterglows have a high chance (≈70 per cent) to be detected by rapid (≲3 h) DDOTI observations if observed on-axis, whereas off-axis afterglows are unlikely to be seen. Finally, we suggest that long-term monitoring of massive BBH events with DDOTI could confirm or rule out late AGN flares associated with these events.

gravitational waves↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Searching for GRB Counterparts to GW Events from the Third Gravitational Wave Observing Run with Fermi-GBM and Swift-BAT

We present Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (Fermi-GBM) and Swift Burst Alert Telescope (Swift-BAT) observations of gravitational-wave (GW) events detected during the third LIGO/Virgo/KAGRA Collaboration observing run (O3). Using Fermi-GBM on-board triggers as well as sub-threshold searches in both Fermi-GBM and Swift-BAT ground data, we search for coincident gamma-ray transients associated with the GW events. No new joint events were found. We therefore calculate flux upper limits for the associated gamma-ray luminosity of each GW event. Using the lack of electromagnetic (EM) emission from binary black hole (BBH) mergers, we begin to constrain theoretical models of any such emission.

GRB↗
NASA NTRS2022

CALET Search for Electromagnetic Counterparts of Gravitational Waves During the LIGO/Virgo O3 Run

The CALorimetric Electron Telescope (CALET)on the International Space Station consists of a high-energy cosmic-ray CALorimeter (CAL)and a lower-energy CALET Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (CGBM). CAL is sensitive to electrons up to 20 TeV, cosmic-ray nuclei from Z=1 throughZ∼40, and gamma rays over the range1 GeV–10 TeV. CGBM observes gamma rays from 7 keV to 20 MeV. The combined CAL-CGBM instrument has conducted a search for gamma-ray bursts (GRBs)since 2015 October. We report here on the results of a search for X-ray/gamma-ray counterparts to gravitational-wave events reported during the LIGO/Virgo observing run O3. No events have been detected that pass all acceptance criteria. We describe the components, performance, and triggering algorithms of the CGBM—the two Hard X-ray Monitors consisting of LaBr3(Ce)scintillators sensitive to 7 keV–1 MeV gamma rays and a Soft Gamma-ray Monitor BGO scintillator sensitive to 40 keV–20 MeV—and the high-energy CAL consisting of a charge detection module, imaging calorimeter, and the fully active total absorption calorimeter. The analysis procedure is described and upper limits to the time-averaged fluxes are presented.

Gamma-ray astronomy↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Searching for GRB Counterparts to GW Events from the Third Gravitational Wave Observing Run with Fermi-GBM and Swift-BAT

We present Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (Fermi-GBM) and Swift Burst Alert Telescope (Swift-BAT) observations of gravitational-wave (GW) events detected during the third LIGO/Virgo/KAGRA Collaboration observing run (O3). Using Fermi-GBM on-board triggers as well as sub-threshold searches in both Fermi-GBM and Swift-BAT ground data, we search for coincident gamma-ray transients associated with the GW events. No new joint events were found. We therefore calculate flux upper limits for the associated gamma-ray luminosity of each GW event. Using the lack of electromagnetic (EM) emission from binary black hole (BBH) mergers, we begin to constrain theoretical models of any such emission.

GRB↗