LIGO Seminar

https://caltech.zoom.us/j/82072539167

Title: "Advances in Precession Modelling for the Fourth LVK Observing Run" with Jonathan Thompson, Caltech

Abstract: As the fourth scientific observing run of the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration approaches, increased detector sensitivities will expand our sightline of merging compact binaries. Many of the expected detections will arrive with signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) comparable to what we have already observed, but we will also potentially observe signals much louder than previously detected. Increasingly high SNRs put to test the accuracy of the compact binary waveform models used in searches and parameter estimation, and certain approximations used to simplify modelling efforts begin to fail for loud signals. This talk will focus specifically on advances that are being made to improve the modelling of precessing black-hole binaries, in which the constituent spins of the black holes are misaligned with the binary's orbital angular momentum. In these situations, the orbital plane undergoes general-relativistic precession and introduces time-varying modulations to the gravitational-wave signal's amplitude. Accurately measuring precession effects of high SNR signals will potentially allow for measurements of individual black hole spins, helping to further improve our understanding of the underlying black hole population and the formation mechanisms involved in forming black-hole binaries.