Detecting the Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background Using Pulsar Timing

By Fredrick A. Jenet, G. Hobbs, Kejia Lee, R. Manchester. 2005

209 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The direct detection of gravitational waves is a major goal of current astrophysics. We provide details of a new method for detecting a stochastic background of gravitational waves using pulsar timing data. Our results show that regular timing observations of 40 pulsars each with a timing accuracy of 100 ns will be able to make a direct detection of the predicted stochastic background from coalescing black holes within 5 years. With an improved prewhitening algorithm, or if the background is at the upper end of the predicted range, a significant detection should be possible with only 20 pulsars.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Oceanography

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/68a8dc92e519a264476e2b6cbed4146bee3dd9b3

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. G. Hobbs
2. R. Manchester
3. A. Sesana
4. N. Wex
5. Michael Kramer
6. R. Shannon
7. S. Burke-Spolaor
8. Jim Cordes

In Oceanography

1. G. Hobbs
2. R. Manchester
3. N. Wex
4. R. Shannon
5. Michael Kramer
6. J. Verbiest
7. Russell T. Edwards
8. Jim Cordes

Citations in the corpus

• Searching for the Nano-Hertz Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background with the Chinese Pulsar Timing Array Data Release I (2023, methodology): “By extracting correlated signatures in pulsar TOAs, it is possible to detect GWs (Hellings & Downs 1983; Jenet et al. 2005), measure masses (Champion et al. 2010; Caballero et al. 2018) and orbital elements of solar system planets (Guo et al. 2019), and study the stability of international (Hobbs…”
• European Pulsar Timing Array Limits on Continuous Gravitational Waves from Individual Supermassive Black Hole Binaries (2015, background): “The timing residuals are the difference between the observed TOAs and the TOAs predicted by the best-fit model, and they carry information about unaccounted noise and potentially unmodelled physical effects, such as GWs, in the datastream (e.g. Hellings & Downs 1983; Jenet et al. 2005).”
• The International Pulsar Timing Array: First Data Release (2016, background): “…commenced routine scientific observations during the timespan covered by the data presented in this work. the past (see e.g. Hellings & Downs 1983; Foster & Backer 1990; Kaspi et al. 1994; Jenet et al. 2005), isotropic and incoherent GW backgrounds (GWB) were considered in a pulsar timing context.”
• Science with the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (2007, background): “The background is detected by looking for correlations between the timing residuals of pulsars that have a wide range of angular separations (Jenet et al. 2005).”
• Gravitational waves from resolvable massive black hole binary systems and observations with Pulsar Timing Arrays (2008, methodology): “The timing residuals of the fit of the actual TOA of the pulses and the TOA according to a given model, carry the physical information about unmodelled effects, including GWs (e.g. Helling & Downs 1983, Jenet et al. 2005).”
• ASSESSING THE ROLE OF SPIN NOISE IN THE PRECISION TIMING OF MILLISECOND PULSARS (2010, methodology): “…that if sub−100 ns stability over 5 − 10 years can be achieved for a number of millisecond pulsars (currently estimated at NPTA = 20 − 40) in a pulsar timing array (PTA), a stochastic background of gravitational waves at a cosmologically significant level can be detected (Jenet et al. 2005).”
• The Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (2009, background): “The initial sample of pulsars was based on the analysis of Jenet et al. (2005) who demonstrated that an isotropic, stochastic gravitational wave background with the amplitude predicted from the available theoretical calculations could be detected if ∼ 20 pulsars were timed weekly over a period of…”
• Timing stability of millisecond pulsars and prospects for gravitational-wave detection (2009, methodology): “Secondly, we do not apply exactly the same algorithm as Jenet et al. (2005).”
• Gravitational wave astronomy of single sources with a pulsar timing array (2011, methodology): “The GW induced TOA signal Rg(t) is the integration of the frequency shift over the observer’s local time,Rg(t) = ∫ δν(t) ν dt (Jenet et al. 2005).”
• Science with ASKAP (2008, background): “The background is detected by looking for correlations between the timing residuals of pulsars that have a wide range of angular separations [141].”
• Expected properties of the first gravitational wave signal detected with pulsar timing arrays (2015, background): “A GWB is commonly characterised by an amplitude and a spectral slope (Jenet et al. 2005).”
• The stochastic gravitational-wave background from massive black hole binary systems: implications for observations with Pulsar Timing Arrays (2008, background): “At these frequencies the most likely signal to be detected is a stochastic GW background generated by the incoherent superposition of radiation from the whole cosmic population of MBHBs1, although individual sources could also be observed (see, e.g., Jenet et al., 2004, 2005a).”
• Upper Bounds on the Low-Frequency Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background from Pulsar Timing Observations: Current Limits and Future Prospects (2006, methodology): “Jenet et al. (2005) developed a technique to make a definitive detection of a stochastic background of GWs by looking for correlations between pulsar observations.”
• Placing limits on the stochastic gravitational-wave background using European Pulsar Timing Array data (2011, background): “Current PTAs aim to reach sensitivities in the order of hc(1 yr) = 10−15 in the future (Jenet et al. 2005), which is over five times more sensitive than the limit we achieve here.”
• tempo2, a new pulsar timing package ¿ II. The timing model and precision estimates (2006, background): “Jenet et al. (2005) conducted simulations of a number of different hypothetical data sets to test the detectability of a gravitational wave background at the level predicted by theory.”
• The Parkes Pulsar Timing Array Project (2006, background): “Detection of the GW background by a PTA was discussed by Jenet et al. (2005).”
• The astrophysical gravitational wave stochastic background (2011, background): “…Einstein Telescope (Abramovici et al. 1992; Bradaschia et al. 1990; Hough 1992; Kuroda et al. 2006) on earth or LISA in space (Bender & the LISA Study Team 1998), or natural detectors such as millisecond pulsars of the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA) (Jenet et al. 2005; Manchester 2006).”