PhD Proposal: Olivia Danner

ADVISOR: Dr. Benjamin Owen

TITLE: Long and Short Searches for Gravitational Waves from Neutron Stars

ABSTRACT: Continuous gravitational waves (CWs) are long-lived, nearly monochromatic gravitational waves (GWs) that are expected to be emitted by rapidly rotating, non-axisymmetric neutron stars. Unlike transient GWs, these have yet to be detected due to the challenges posed by the low signal amplitude and high computational demand. These difficulties can be mitigated by constraining search parameters with timing solutions from electromagnetic observations; however, it takes years of observational data to obtain a full timing solution. Rather than focusing only on sources with well-known parameters, the first part of this project proposes a targeted search for CWs from known pulsars with incomplete timing solutions. If a signal is not detected, upper limits will be established on gravitational wave amplitudes, better informing future searches.

Burst gravitational waves are short-lived GWs that may be associated with the excitation of fundamental oscillation modes of neutron stars. The waveforms of such signals are well-known and therefore well-suited for matched filtering. The second part of this project proposes using matched filtering techniques to detect burst GWs from pulsar glitches and magnetar flares, an approach that has not yet been attempted for this type of signal.

By conducting these searches, this project aims to contribute to the broader goal of understanding the physics of dense matter.