Testing the validity of the phenomenological gravitational waveform models for nonspinning binary black hole searches at low masses

Abstract

The phenomenological gravitational waveform models, which we refer to as PhenomA, PhenomB and PhenomC, generate full inspiral-merger-ringdown waveforms of coalescing binary back holes (BBHs). These models are defined in the Fourier domain, thus can be used for fast matched filtering in the gravitational wave search. PhenomA has been developed for nonspinning BBH waveforms, while PhenomB and PhenomC were designed to model the waveforms of BBH systems with nonprecessing (aligned) spins, but can also be used for nonspinning systems. In this work, we study the validity of the phenomenological models for nonspinning BBH searches at low masses, $m_{1,2}\ge 4Msun$ and $m_1+m_2\equiv M\le 30Msun$, with Advanced LIGO. As our complete signal waveform model, we adopt EOBNRv2 that is a time-domain inspiral-merger-ringdown waveform model. To investigate the search efficiency of the phenomenological template models, we calculate fitting factors by exploring overlap surfaces. We find that only PhenomC is valid to obtain the fitting factors better than 0.97 in the mass range of $M<15Msun$. Above $15Msun$, PhenomA is most efficient in symmetric mass region, PhenomB is most efficient in highly asymmetric mass region, and PhenomC is most efficient in the intermediate region. Specifically, we propose an effective phenomenological template family that can be constructed by employing the phenomenological models in four subregions individually. We find that fitting factors of the effective templates are better than 0.97 in our entire mass region and mostly greater than 0.99.

13 pages, 4 figures, matched to the published version in CQG

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Cited by in corpus (5)

• Improvement of the parameter measurement accuracy by the third-generation gravitational wave detector Einstein Telescope
• Efficiency of nonspinning templates in gravitational wave searches for aligned-spin binary black holes
• Gravitational Wave Searches for Aligned-Spin Binary Neutron Stars Using Nonspinning Templates
• Accuracy in Measuring the Neutron Star Mass in Gravitational Wave Parameter Estimation for Black Hole-Neutron Star Binaries
• Systematic Bias Due to Nonspinning Template Waveforms in the Gravitational Wave Parameter Estimation for Aligned-Spin Binary Black Holes