Impact of a Midband Gravitational Wave Experiment On Detectability of Cosmological Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds

Abstract

We make forecasts for the impact a future "midband" space-based gravitational wave experiment, most sensitive to $10^{-2}-10$ Hz, could have on potential detections of cosmological stochastic gravitational wave backgrounds (SGWBs). Specific proposed midband experiments considered are TianGo, B-DECIGO and AEDGE. We propose a combined power-law integrated sensitivity (CPLS) curve combining GW experiments over different frequency bands, which shows the midband improves sensitivity to SGWBs by up to two orders of magnitude at $10^{-2}-10$ Hz. We consider GW emission from cosmic strings and phase transitions as benchmark examples of cosmological SGWBs. We explicitly model various astrophysical SGWB sources, most importantly from unresolved black hole mergers. Using Markov Chain Monte Carlo, we demonstrated that midband experiments can, when combined with LIGO A+ and LISA, significantly improve sensitivities to cosmological SGWBs and better separate them from astrophysical SGWBs. In particular, we forecast that a midband experiment improves sensitivity to cosmic string tension $G\mu$ by up to a factor of $10$, driven by improved component separation from astrophysical sources. For phase transitions, a midband experiment can detect signals peaking at $0.1-1$ Hz, which for our fiducial model corresponds to early Universe temperatures of $T_{\ast }\sim 10^4-10^6$ GeV, generally beyond the reach of LIGO and LISA. The midband closes an energy gap and better captures characteristic spectral shape information. It thus substantially improves measurement of the properties of phase transitions at lower energies of $T_{\ast }\sim O(10^3)$ GeV, potentially relevant to new physics at the electroweak scale, whereas in this energy range LISA alone will detect an excess but not effectively measure the phase transition parameters. Our modelling code and chains are publicly available.

arXiv commentMatches version accepted to PRD. 14 pages, 8 figures, code available at https://github.com/sbird/grav_midband

References in corpus (106)

• Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger
• emcee: The MCMC Hammer
• TianQin: a space-borne gravitational wave detector
• GW190521: A Binary Black Hole Merger with a Total Mass of $150M_{\odot }$
• Science Case for the Einstein Telescope
• Science with the space-based interferometer eLISA. II: Gravitational waves from cosmological phase transitions
• Cosmological Backgrounds of Gravitational Waves
• The NANOGrav 12.5-year Data Set: Search For An Isotropic Stochastic Gravitational-Wave Background
• Gravitational-wave sensitivity curves
• Detecting gravitational waves from cosmological phase transitions with LISA: an update
• Science with the space-based interferometer LISA. V: Extreme mass-ratio inspirals
• Intermediate and Extreme Mass-Ratio Inspirals -- Astrophysics, Science Applications and Detection using LISA
• Taiji Program: Gravitational-Wave Sources
• Sensitivity curves for searches for gravitational-wave backgrounds
• Numerical simulations of acoustically generated gravitational waves at a first order phase transition
• Detector configuration of DECIGO/BBO and identification of cosmological neutron-star binaries
• Detection methods for stochastic gravitational-wave backgrounds: a unified treatment
• Shape of the acoustic gravitational wave power spectrum from a first order phase transition
• Science with the space-based interferometer LISA. IV: Probing inflation with gravitational waves
• A template bank for gravitational waveforms from coalescing binary black holes: non-spinning binaries
• An Upper Limit on the Stochastic Gravitational-Wave Background of Cosmological Origin
• AEDGE: Atomic Experiment for Dark Matter and Gravity Exploration in Space
• Gravitational Waves From a Dark (Twin) Phase Transition
• The number of cosmic string loops
• On the Maximal Strength of a First-Order Electroweak Phase Transition and its Gravitational Wave Signal
• General Properties of the Gravitational Wave Spectrum from Phase Transitions
• Search for the isotropic stochastic background using data from Advanced LIGO's second observing run
• Missing Link Found? --- The ``runaway'' path to supermassive black holes
• Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds
• Gravitational wave energy budget in strongly supercooled phase transitions
• New Sensitivity Curves for Gravitational-Wave Signals from Cosmological Phase Transitions
• Cosmological evolution of cosmic string loops
• Event rate estimates for LISA extreme mass ratio capture sources
• Cosmic String Interpretation of NANOGrav Pulsar Timing Data
• Probing the gravitational wave background from cosmic strings with LISA
• Placing limits on the stochastic gravitational-wave background using European Pulsar Timing Array data
• Has NANOGrav found first evidence for cosmic strings?
• M33: A Galaxy with No Supermassive Black Hole
• Gravitational Waves from a Compact Star in a Circular, Inspiral Orbit, in the Equatorial Plane of a Massive, Spinning Black Hole, as Observed by LISA
• Reconstructing the spectral shape of a stochastic gravitational wave background with LISA
• Relativistic Dynamics and Extreme Mass Ratio Inspirals
• BBO and the Neutron-Star-Binary Subtraction Problem
• CMB power spectrum contribution from cosmic strings using field-evolution simulations of the Abelian Higgs model
• Sensitivity curves for spaceborne gravitational wave interferometers
• Collisions of Cosmic F- and D-strings
• Numerical simulations of string networks in the Abelian-Higgs model
• Gravitational waves from first-order cosmological phase transitions: lifetime of the sound wave source
• Vorticity, kinetic energy, and suppressed gravitational wave production in strong first order phase transitions
• From NANOGrav to LIGO with metastable cosmic strings
• Constraints on cosmic strings using data from the first Advanced LIGO observing run
• On the Evolution of Abelian-Higgs String Networks
• Probing the pre-BBN universe with gravitational waves from cosmic strings
• Beyond the Standard Models with Cosmic Strings
• Testing Seesaw and Leptogenesis with Gravitational Waves
• Phase Transitions in an Expanding Universe: Stochastic Gravitational Waves in Standard and Non-Standard Histories
• Improved reconstruction of a stochastic gravitational wave background with LISA
• Gravitational Waves and Dark Radiation from Dark Phase Transition: Connecting NANOGrav Pulsar Timing Data and Hubble Tension
• The Mock LISA Data Challenges: from Challenge 3 to Challenge 4
• Probing the Electroweak Phase Transition with Higgs Factories and Gravitational Waves
• Cosmic Archaeology with Gravitational Waves from Cosmic Strings
• The Missing Link in Gravitational-Wave Astronomy: Discoveries waiting in the decihertz range
• Stochastic Gravitational-Wave Background due to Primordial Binary Black Hole Mergers
• Detecting a Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background in the presence of a Galactic Foreground and Instrument Noise
• Updated predictions for gravitational waves produced in a strongly supercooled phase transition
• A Resonant Mode for Gravitational Wave Detectors based on Atom Interferometry
• The LISA Response Function
• Scaling of Multi-Tension Cosmic Superstring Networks
• Probing the scale of grand unification with gravitational waves
• Probing the anisotropies of a stochastic gravitational-wave background using a network of ground-based laser interferometers
• Gravitational Waves: Sources, Detectors and Searches
• Fingerprint of Low-Scale Leptogenesis in the Primordial Gravitational-Wave Spectrum
• The Mock LISA Data Challenges: from Challenge 1B to Challenge 3
• Nonperturbative analysis of the gravitational waves from a first-order electroweak phase transition
• Whispers from the dark side: Confronting light new physics with NANOGrav data
• The impact of realistic models of mass segregation on the event rate of extreme-mass ratio inspirals and cusp re-growth
• NANOGrav signal from MHD turbulence at QCD phase transition in the early universe
• Astrophysics and cosmology with a decihertz gravitational-wave detector: TianGO
• Baryogenesis from a dark first-order phase transition
• Gravitational wave background from extreme mass ratio inspirals
• The optimal search for an astrophysical gravitational-wave background
• Observational prospects for gravitational waves from hidden or dark chiral phase transitions
• Detecting Intermediate-Mass Ratio Inspirals From The Ground And Space
• A fresh look at the gravitational-wave signal from cosmological phase transitions
• Probing non-Gaussian Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds with LISA
• Cosmic String Loops, Large and Small
• Jumping the gap: searching for LIGO's biggest black holes
• Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background from Global Cosmic Strings
• Gravitational Waves from First-Order Phase Transition in a Simple Axion-Like Particle Model
• Music from the heavens - Gravitational waves from supermassive black hole mergers in the EAGLE simulations
• Spectral separation of the stochastic gravitational-wave background for LISA: observing both cosmological and astrophysical backgrounds
• BSM with Cosmic Strings: Heavy, up to EeV mass, Unstable Particles
• Imprint of a scalar era on the primordial spectrum of gravitational waves
• Foreground cleaning and template-free stochastic background extraction for LISA
• Probing General Relativity With Mergers of Supermassive and Intermediate-Mass Black Holes
• Stochastic background of gravitational waves emitted by magnetars
• Radiation from cosmic string standing waves
• Gravitational Wave Bursts as Harbingers of Cosmic Strings Diluted by Inflation
• Irreducible background of gravitational waves from a cosmic defect network: update and comparison of numerical techniques
• Gravitational wave background from rotating neutron stars
• Using a Primordial Gravitational Wave Background to Illuminate New Physics
• Phase Transitions from the Fifth Dimension
• Neutrino and gravitational wave signal of a delayed-detonation model of Type Ia supernovae
• Galactic and Cosmic Type Ia SN rates: is it possible to impose constraints on SNIa progenitors?
• On the Gravitational Wave Background from Black Hole Binaries after the First LIGO Detections
• The Probability Distribution of Astrophysical Gravitational-Wave Background Fluctuations
• Gravitational Waves from Supersymmetry Breaking

Cited by in corpus (15)

• Cosmology with the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna
• Baryogenesis from ultralight primordial black holes and strong gravitational waves from cosmic strings
• Gravitational Waves from Global Cosmic Strings and Cosmic Archaeology
• Snowmass2021 Cosmic Frontier White Paper:Primordial Black Hole Dark Matter
• Non-Gaussian Stochastic Gravitational Waves from Phase Transitions
• Impact of LIGO-Virgo black hole binaries on gravitational wave background searches
• Unraveling Cosmological Anisotropies within Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds
• GRB 211211A-like Events and How Gravitational Waves May Tell Their Origins
• Discerning Singlet and Triplet scalars at the electroweak phase transition and Gravitational Wave
• Realistic Detection and Early Warning of Binary Neutron Stars with Decihertz Gravitational-wave Observatories
• Sensitivity of third-generation interferometers to extra polarizations in the Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background
• Imprint of Early Dark Energy in Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background
• Polarization Properties of the Electromagnetic Response to High-frequency Gravitational Wave
• Gravitational Waves from Primordial Black Hole Dark Matter Spikes
• Exploring the multiband gravitational wave background with a semi-analytic galaxy formation model