Testing Einstein's Weak Equivalence Principle With Gravitational Waves

Abstract

A conservative constraint on the Einstein Weak Equivalence Principle (WEP) can be obtained under the assumption that the observed time delay between correlated particles from astronomical sources is dominated by the gravitational fields through which they move. Current limits on the WEP are mainly based on the observed time delays of photons with different energies. It is highly desirable to develop more accurate tests that include the gravitational wave (GW) sector. The detection by the advanced LIGO/VIRGO systems of gravitational waves will provide attractive candidates for constraining the WEP, extending the tests to gravitational interactions, with potentially higher accuracy. Considering the capabilities of the advanced LIGO/VIRGO network and the source direction uncertainty, we show that the joint detection of GWs and electromagnetic signals could probe the WEP to an accuracy down to $10^{-10}$, which is one order of magnitude tighter than previous limits, and seven orders of magnitude tighter than the multi-messenger (photons and neutrinos) results by supernova 1987A.

Accepted for publication in PRD

References in corpus (11)

• Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger
• Advanced Virgo: a 2nd generation interferometric gravitational wave detector
• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• LIGO: The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory
• Fermi GBM Observations of LIGO Gravitational Wave event GW150914
• Electromagnetic Counterparts to Black Hole Mergers Detected by LIGO
• Kinematics of the stellar halo and the mass distribution of the Milky Way using BHB stars
• Limits on Einstein's Equivalence Principle from the first localized Fast Radio Burst FRB 150418
• Tests of the Einstein Equivalence Principle using TeV Blazars
• Probing the Birth of Post-merger Millisecond Magnetars by X-ray and Gamma-ray Emission
• Testing Einstein's Equivalence Principle with Cosmological Fast Radio Bursts behind Clusters of Galaxies

Cited by in corpus (42)

• Theoretical Physics Implications of the Binary Black-Hole Mergers GW150914 and GW151226
• Mergers of Charged Black Holes: Gravitational Wave Events, Short Gamma-Ray Bursts, and Fast Radio Bursts
• GW170817 Falsifies Dark Matter Emulators
• Neutrino-dominated accretion flows as the central engine of gamma-ray bursts
• Hunting for Dark Particles with Gravitational Waves
• Speed of Gravitational Waves from Strongly Lensed Gravitational Waves and Electromagnetic Signals
• GW170817/GRB 170817A/AT2017gfo association: some implications for physics and astrophysics
• Testing the equivalence principle and Lorentz invariance with PeV neutrinos from blazar flares
• Atomic source selection in space-borne gravitational wave detection
• Constraints on cosmological viscosity and self interacting dark matter from gravitational wave observations
• Limits on the Neutrino Velocity, Lorentz Invariance, and the Weak Equivalence Principle with TeV Neutrinos from Gamma-Ray Bursts
• Multimessenger tests of the weak equivalence principle from GW170817 and its electromagnetic counterparts
• Limits on the Weak Equivalence Principle and Photon Mass with FRB 121102 Sub-pulses
• Tests of CPT invariance in gravitational waves with LIGO-Virgo catalog GWTC-1
• Constraints on neutrino speed, weak equivalence principle violation, Lorentz invariance violation, and dual lensing from the first high-energy astrophysical neutrino source TXS 0506+056
• Dispersion by pulsars, magnetars, fast radio bursts and massive electromagnetism at very low radio frequencies
• Constraints from the Time Lag between Gravitational Waves and Gamma Rays: Implications of GW 170817 and GRB 170817A
• Constraining alternative theories of gravity using GW$150914$ and GW$151226$
• Shortcomings of Shapiro delay-based tests of the equivalence principle on cosmological scales
• Testing Einstein's weak equivalence principle with a 0.4-nanosecond giant pulse of the Crab pulsar
• New test of weak equivalence principle using polarized light from astrophysical events
• A New Method to Test the Einstein's Weak Equivalence Principle
• Testing Einstein's Equivalence Principle with Short Gamma-ray Bursts
• A Comprehensive Analysis on Repeating Fast Radio Bursts
• Galactic Shapiro Delay to the Crab Pulsar and limit on Einstein's Equivalence Principle Violation
• Test of the Weak Equivalence Principle using LIGO observations of GW150914 and Fermi observations of GBM transient 150914
• Testing Weak Equivalence Principle with Strongly Lensed Cosmic Transients
• Cosmic Transients, Einstein's Equivalence Principle and Dark Matter Halos
• Precision Test of the Weak Equivalence Principle from Gamma-Ray Burst Polarization
• Constraints on Equivalence Principle Violation from Gamma Ray Bursts
• Consistent equivalence principle tests with fast radio bursts
• Tests of weak equivalence principle with the gravitational wave signals in the LIGO-Virgo catalogue GWTC-1
• Black Hole Mass Function of Coalescing Neutron Star-Black Hole Binary Systems: The Prospect of Reconstruction with the Gravitational Wave Observations
• Propagation of gravitational waves in an expanding background in the presence of a point mass
• Damping of gravitational waves in f(R) gravity
• Testing the weak equivalence principle with the binary neutron star merger GW170817: the gravitational contribution of the host galaxy
• Constraining Einstein's Equivalence Principle With Multi-Wavelength Observations of Polarized Blazars
• Testing the variation of the fine structure constant with strongly lensed gravitational waves
• Constraining Einstein's Equivalence Principle With Multi-Wavelength Polarized astrophysical Sources
• Testing Weak Equivalence Principle with IceCube Event and Blazar
• Upper limits on Einstein's weak equivalence principle placed by uncertainties of dispersion measures of fast radio bursts
• Testing Einstein's Equivalence Principle with Supercluster Laniakea's Gravitational Field