Search for gravitational wave radiation associated with the pulsating tail of the SGR 1806 20 hyperflare of 27 December 2004 using LIGO

Abbott, B. et al. (2007) Search for gravitational wave radiation associated with the pulsating tail of the SGR 1806 20 hyperflare of 27 December 2004 using LIGO. Physical Review D, 76(6), 062003. (doi: 10.1103/PhysRevD.76.062003)

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Abstract

We have searched for gravitational waves (GWs) associated with the SGR 1806-20 hyperflare of 27 December 2004. This event, originating from a Galactic neutron star, displayed exceptional energetics. Recent investigations of the x-ray light curve’s pulsating tail revealed the presence of quasiperiodic oscillations (QPOs) in the 30–2000 Hz frequency range, most of which coincides with the bandwidth of the LIGO detectors. These QPOs, with well-characterized frequencies, can plausibly be attributed to seismic modes of the neutron star which could emit GWs. Our search targeted potential quasimonochromatic GWs lasting for tens of seconds and emitted at the QPO frequencies. We have observed no candidate signals above a predetermined threshold, and our lowest upper limit was set by the 92.5 Hz QPO observed in the interval from 150 s to 260 s after the start of the flare. This bound corresponds to a (90% confidence) root-sum-squared amplitude h<sub>rss-det⁡</sub><sup>90%</sup>=4.5×10<sup>-22</sup>  strain  Hz<sup>-1/2</sup> on the GW waveform strength in the detectable polarization state reaching our Hanford (WA) 4 km detector. We illustrate the astrophysical significance of the result via an estimated characteristic energy in GW emission that we would expect to be able to detect. The above result corresponds to 7.7×10<sup>46</sup>  erg (=4.3×10<sup>-8</sup>  M<sub>⊙</sub>c<sup>2</sup>), which is of the same order as the total (isotropic) energy emitted in the electromagnetic spectrum. This result provides a means to probe the energy reservoir of the source with the best upper limit on the GW waveform strength published and represents the first broadband asteroseismology measurement using a GW detector.

Item Type:Articles
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:Heptonstall, Dr Alastair and Grant, Mr Alastair and Cagnoli, Dr Gianpietro and Cantley, Dr Caroline and Rowan, Professor Sheila and Messenger, Dr Christopher and Bogenstahl, Miss Johanna and Casey, Dr Morag and Robertson, Professor Norna and Barr, Dr Bryan and Tokmakov, Dr Kirill and Veitch, Dr John and Plissi, Dr Michael and Woan, Professor Graham and Crooks, Dr David and Heng, Professor Ik Siong and Hough, Professor James and Ward, Professor Henry and Newton, Dr Gavin and Torrie, Dr Calum and Huttner, Dr Sabina and Strain, Professor Kenneth and Jones, Mr Russell and Pitkin, Dr Matthew and Murray, Dr Peter and Barton, Dr Mark
Authors: Abbott, B., Abbott, R., Adhikari, R., Agresti, J., Ajith, P., Allen, B., Amin, R., Anderson, B., Anderson, W., Arain, M., Araya, M., Armandula, H., Ashley, M., Aston, S., Aufmuth, P., Aulbert, C., Babak, S., Ballmer, S., Bantilan, H., Barish, B., Barker, C., Barker, D., Barr, B., Barriga, P., Barton, M.A., Bayer, K., Belczynski, K., Betzwieser, J., Beyersdorf, P., Bhawal, B., Bilenko, I., Billingsley, G., Biswas, R., Black, E., Blackburn, K., Blackburn, L., Blair, D., Bland, B., Bogenstahl, J., Bogue, L., Bork, R., Boschi, V., Bose, S., Brady, P., Braginsky, V., Brau, J., Brinkmann, M., Brooks, A., Brown, D., Bullington, A., Bunkowski, A., Buonanno, A., Burmeister, O., Busby, D., Byer, R., Cadonati, L., Cagnoli, G., Camp, J., Cannizzo, J., Cannon, K., Cantley, C., Cao, J., Cardenas, L., Casey, M., Castaldi, G., Cepeda, C., Chalkey, E., Charlton, P., Chatterji, S., Chelkowski, S., Chen, Y., Chiadini, F., Chin, D., Chin, E., Chow, J., Christensen, N., Clark, J., Cochrane, P., Cokelaer, T., Colacino, C., Coldwell, R., Conte, R., Cook, D., Corbitt, T., Coward, D., Coyne, D., Creighton, J., Creighton, T., Croce, R., Crooks, D.R.M., Cruise, A., Cumming, A., Dalrymple, J., DAmbrosio, E., Danzmann, K., Davies, G., Debra, D., Degallaix, J., Degree, M., Demma, T., Dergachev, V., Desai, S., DeSalvo, R., Dhurandhar, S., Az, M., Dickson, J., Di Credico, A., Diederichs, G., Dietz, A., Doomes, E., Drever, R., Dumas, J., Dupuis, R., Dwyer, J., Ehrens, P., Espinoza, E., Etzel, T., Evans, M., Evans, T., Fairhurst, S., Fan, Y., Fazi, D., Fejer, M., Finn, L., Fiumara, V., Fotopoulos, N., Franzen, A., Franzen, K., Freise, A., Frey, R., Fricke, T., Fritschel, P., Frolov, V., Fyffe, M., Galdi, V., Garofoli, J., Gholami, I., Giaime, J., Giampanis, S., Giardina, K., Goda, K., Goetz, E., Goggin, L., Gonzalez, G., Gossler, S., Grant, A., Gras, S., Gray, C., Gray, M., Greenhalgh, J., Gretarsson, A., Grosso, R., Grote, H., Grunewald, S., Guenther, M., Gustafson, R., Hage, B., Hammer, D., Hanna, C., Hanson, J., Harms, J., Harry, G., Harstad, E., Hayler, T., Heefner, J., Heng, I., Heptonstall, A., Heurs, M., Hewitson, M., Hild, S., Hirose, E., Hoak, D., Hosken, D., Hough, J., Howell, E., Hoyland, D., Huttner, S.H., Ingram, D., Innerhofer, E., Ito, M., Itoh, Y., Ivanov, A., Jackrel, D., Johnson, B., Johnson, W., Jones, D., Jones, G., Jones, R., Ju, L., Kalmus, P., Kalogera, V., Kamat, S., Kasprzyk, D., Katsavounidis, E., Kawabe, K., Kawamura, S., Kawazoe, F., Kells, W., Keppel, D., Khalili, F., Kim, C., King, P., Kissel, J., Klimenko, S., Kokeyama, K., Kondrashov, V., Kopparapu, R., Kozak, D., Krishnan, B., Kwee, P., Lam, P., Landry, M., Lantz, B., Lazzarini, A., Lee, B., Lei, M., Leiner, J., Leonhardt, V., Leonor, I., Libbrecht, K., Lindquist, P., Lockerbie, N., Longo, M., Lormand, M., Lubinski, M., Lueck, H., Machenschalk, B., MacInnis, M., Mageswaran, M., Mailand, K., Malec, M., Mandic, V., Marano, S., Marka, S., Markowitz, J., Maros, E., Martin, I., Marx, J., Mason, K., Matone, L., Matta, V., Mavalvala, N., McCarthy, R., McClelland, D., McGuire, S., McHugh, M., McKenzie, K., McNabb, J., McWilliams, S., Meier, T., Melissinos, A., Mendell, G., Mercer, R., Meshkov, S., Messaritaki, E., Messenger, C.J., Meyers, D., Mikhailov, E., Mitra, S., Mitrofanov, V., Mitselmakher, G., Mittleman, R., Miyakawa, O., Mohanty, S., Moreno, G., Mossavi, K., MowLowry, C., Moylan, A., Mudge, D., Mueller, G., Mukherjee, S., Muller-Ebhardt, H., Munch, J., Murray, P., Myers, E., Myers, J., Nash, T., Newton, G., Nishizawa, A., Numata, K., OReilly, B., OShaughnessy, R., Ottaway, D., Overmier, H., Owen, B., Pan, Y., Papa, M., Parameshwaraiah, V., Patel, P., Pedraza, M., Penn, S., Pierro, V., Pinto, I., Pitkin, M., Pletsch, H., Plissi, M.V., Postiglione, F., Prix, R., Quetschke, V., Raab, F., Rabeling, D., Radkins, H., Rahkola, R., Rainer, N., Rakhmanov, M., Rawlins, K., Ray-Majumder, S., Re, V., Rehbein, H., Reid, S., Reitze, D., Ribichini, L., Riesen, R., Riles, K., Rivera, B., Robertson, N., Robinson, C., Robinson, E., Roddy, S., Rodriguez, A., Rogan, A., Rollins, J., Romano, J., Romie, J., Route, R., Rowan, S., Rudiger, A., Ruet, L., Russell, P., Ryan, K., Sakata, S., Samidi, M., de la Jordana, L., Sandberg, V., Sannibale, V., Saraf, S., Sarin, P., Sathyaprakash, B., Sato, S., Saulson, P., Savage, R., Savov, P., Schediwy, S., Schilling, R., Schnabel, R., Schofield, R., Schutz, B., Schwinberg, P., Scott, S., Searle, A., Sears, B., Seifert, F., Sellers, D., Sengupta, A., Shawhan, P., Shoemaker, D., Sibley, A., Sidles, J., Siemens, X., Sigg, D., Sinha, S., Sintes, A., Slagmolen, B., Slutsky, J., Smith, J., Smith, M., Somiya, K., Strain, K., Strom, D., Stuver, A., Summerscales, T., Sun, K., Sung, M., Sutton, P., Takahashi, H., Tanner, D., Tarallo, M., Taylor, R., Thacker, J., Thorne, K., Thorne, K., Thuring, A., Tinto, M., Tokmakov, K.V., Torres, C., Torrie, C., Traylor, G., Trias, M., Tyler, W., Ugolini, D., Ungarelli, C., Urbanek, K., Vahlbruch, H., Vallisneri, M., Van Den Broeck, C., Varvella, M., Vass, S., Vecchio, A., Veitch, J., Veitch, P., Villar, A., Vorvick, C., Vyachanin, S., Waldman, S., Wallace, L., Ward, H., Ward, R., Watts, K., Webber, D., Weidner, A., Weinert, M., Weinstein, A., Weiss, R., Wen, S., Wette, K., Whelan, J., Whitbeck, D., Whitcomb, S., Whiting, B., Wilkinson, C., Willems, P., Williams, L., Willke, B., Wilmut, I., Winkler, W., Wipf, C., Wise, S., Wiseman, A., Woan, G., Woods, D., Wooley, R., Worden, J., Wu, W., Yakushin, I., Yamamoto, H., Yan, Z., Yoshida, S., Yunes, N., Zanolin, M., Zhang, J., Zhang, L., Zhao, C., Zotov, N., Zucker, M., zur Muhlen, H., and Zweizig, J.
College/School:College of Science and Engineering > School of Physics and Astronomy
Research Centre:College of Science and Engineering > School of Physics and Astronomy > Institute for Gravitational Research
Journal Name:Physical Review D
Publisher:American Physical Society
ISSN:1550-7998
ISSN (Online):1089-4918

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