Search for gravitational radiation from intermediate mass black hole binaries in data from the second LIGO-Virgo joint science run

Aasi, J. and Lockerbie, N. A. and Tokmakov, K. V., LIGO Scientific Collaboration, Virgo Collaboration (2014) Search for gravitational radiation from intermediate mass black hole binaries in data from the second LIGO-Virgo joint science run. Physical Review D, 89 (12). 122003. ISSN 1550-2368 (https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.89.122003)

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Abstract

This paper reports on an unmodeled, all-sky search for gravitational waves from merging intermediate mass black hole binaries (IMBHB). The search was performed on data from the second joint science run of the LIGO and Virgo detectors (July 2009-October 2010) and was sensitive to IMBHBs with a range up to similar to 200 Mpc, averaged over the possible sky positions and inclinations of the binaries with respect to the line of sight. No significant candidate was found. Upper limits on the coalescence-rate density of nonspinning IMBHBs with total masses between 100 and 450 M-circle dot and mass ratios between 0.25 and 1 were placed by combining this analysis with an analogous search performed on data from the first LIGO-Virgo joint science run (November 2005-October 2007). The most stringent limit was set for systems consisting of two 88 M-circle dot black holes and is equal to 0.12 Mpc(-3) Myr(-1) at the 90% confidence level. This paper also presents the first estimate, for the case of an unmodeled analysis, of the impact on the search range of IMBHB spin configurations: the visible volume for IMBHBs with nonspinning components is roughly doubled for a population of IMBHBs with spins aligned with the binary's orbital angular momentum and uniformly distributed in the dimensionless spin parameter up to 0.8, whereas an analogous population with antialigned spins decreases the visible volume by similar to 20%.

ORCID iDs

Aasi, J., Lockerbie, N. A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1678-3260 and Tokmakov, K. V. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2808-6593;
  • Item type:Article
    ID code:50739
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    12 June 2014
    Published
    Notes:J. Aasi et al. (LIGO Scientific Collaboration and Virgo Collaboration) Phys. Rev. D 89, 122003. © 2014 American Physical Society
    Subjects:Science > Astronomy
    Science > Physics
    Department:Faculty of Science > Physics
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:10 Dec 2014 11:02
    Last modified:11 Nov 2024 10:53
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/50739
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