Coincident detection significance in multimessenger astronomy

Abstract

We derive a Bayesian criterion for assessing whether signals observed in two separate data sets originate from a common source. The Bayes factor for a common vs. unrelated origin of signals includes an overlap integral of the posterior distributions over the common source parameters. Focusing on multimessenger gravitational-wave astronomy, we apply the method to the spatial and temporal association of independent gravitational-wave and electromagnetic (or neutrino) observations. As an example, we consider the coincidence between the recently discovered gravitational-wave signal GW170817 from a binary neutron star merger and the gamma-ray burst GRB 170817A: we find that the common source model is enormously favored over a model describing them as unrelated signals.

arXiv comment7 pages, 1 figure

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• Search for Coincident Gravitational-wave and Fast Radio Burst Events from 4-OGC and the First CHIME/FRB Catalog
• Joint analysis of gravitational-wave and electromagnetic data of mergers: breaking an afterglow model degeneracy in GW170817 and in future events
• How to search for multiple messengers -- a general framework beyond two messengers
• Missed opportunities: GRB 211211A and the case for continual gravitational-wave coverage with a single observatory
• A Unified $p_{\mathrm{astro}}$ for Gravitational Waves: Consistently Combining Information from Multiple Search Pipelines
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• Search for Coincident Gravitational Wave and Long Gamma-Ray Bursts from 4-OGC and the Fermi-GBM/Swift-BAT Catalog
• Assessing coincident neutrino detections using population models
• The origin of the coherent radio flash potentially associated with GRB 201006A
• A hierarchical Bayesian approach to point source analysis in high-energy neutrino telescopes
• Deep Multimessenger Search for Compact Binary Mergers in LIGO, Virgo, and Fermi/GBM Data from 2016-2017
• Inferring jet physics from neutron star - black hole mergers with gravitational waves
• Multimessenger Analysis Strategy for Core-Collapse Supernova Search: Gravitational Waves and Low-energy Neutrinos