Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger

Creators: Thorne, K. S.; Drever, R. W. P.; Adhikari, R. X.; Chen, Y.; Ott, C. D.; Weinstein, A. J.; Abbott, B. P.; Abbott, R.; Abernathy, M. R.; Anderson, S. B.; Arai, K.; Araya, M. C.; Barayoga, J. C.; Barish, B. C.; Berger, B. K.; Billingsley, G.; Blackburn, J. K.; Bork, R.; Brooks, A. F.; Cahillane, C.; Callister, T.; Cepeda, C. B.; Chakraborty, R.; Chalermsongsak, T.; Couvares, P.; Coyne, D. C.; Dergachev, V.; Ehrens, P.; Engels, W.; Etzel, T.; Gossan, S. E.; Gushwa, K. E.; Hall, E. D.; Heefner, J.; Heptonstall, A. W.; Hodge, K. A.; Isi, M.; Jacobson, M. B.; Kells, W.; Kanner, J. B.; Kondrashov, V.; Korth, W. Z.; Kozak, D. B.; Lazzarini, A.; Li, T. G. F.; Mageswaran, M.; Maros, E.; Martynov, D. V.; Marx, J. N.; McIntyre, G.; McIver, J.; Meshkov, S.; Pedraza, M.; Perreca, A.; Price, L. R.; Quintero, E. A.; Robertson, N. A.; Rollins, J. G.; Sachdev, S.; Sanchez, E. J.; Sanders, G. H.; Schmidt, P.; Shao, Z.; Singer, A.; Smith, M. R.; Smith, N. D.; Smith, R. J. E.; Taylor, R; Thirugnanasambandam, M. P.; Torrie, C. I.; Vajente, G.; Vallisneri, M.; Vass, S.; Wallace, L.; Whitcomb, S. E.; Willems, P. A.; Williams, R. D.; Wipf, C. C.; Yamamoto, H.; Zhang, L.; Zucker, M. E.; Zweizig, J.; LIGO Scientific Collaboration; Virgo Collaboration

Abstract

On September 14, 2015 at 09:50:45 UTC the two detectors of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory simultaneously observed a transient gravitational-wave signal. The signal sweeps upwards in frequency from 35 to 250 Hz with a peak gravitational-wave strain of 1.0×10^(−21). It matches the waveform predicted by general relativity for the inspiral and merger of a pair of black holes and the ringdown of the resulting single black hole. The signal was observed with a matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 24 and a false alarm rate estimated to be less than 1 event per 203 000 years, equivalent to a significance greater than 5.1σ. The source lies at a luminosity distance of 410 +160/−180 Mpc corresponding to a redshift z=0.09 +0.03/−0.04. In the source frame, the initial black hole masses are 36+5−4M_⊙ and 29+4−4M_⊙, and the final black hole mass is 62+4−4M⊙, with 3.0+0.5−0.5M_⊙c^2 radiated in gravitational waves. All uncertainties define 90% credible intervals. These observations demonstrate the existence of binary stellar-mass black hole systems. This is the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the first observation of a binary black hole merger.

Additional Information

This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI. Received Jan 21 2016. Published 11 Feb 2016. The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the United States National Science Foundation (NSF) for the construction and operation of the LIGO Laboratory and Advanced LIGO as well as the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) of the United Kingdom, the Max-Planck Society (MPS), and the State of Niedersachsen, Germany, for support of the construction of Advanced LIGO and construction and operation of the GEO 600 detector. Additional support for Advanced LIGO was provided by the Australian Research Council. The authors gratefully acknowledge the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), and the Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research, for the construction and operation of the Virgo detector, and for the creation and support of the EGO consortium. The authors also gratefully acknowledge research support from these agencies as well as by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research of India, Department of Science and Technology, India, Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB), India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, India, the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, the Conselleria d'Economia i Competitivitat and Conselleria d'Educació, Cultura i Universitats of the Govern de les Illes Balears, the National Science Centre of Poland, the European Commission, the Royal Society, the Scottish Funding Council, the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance, the Hungarian Scientific Research Fund (OTKA), the Lyon Institute of Origins (LIO), the National Research Foundation of Korea, Industry Canada and the Province of Ontario through the Ministry of Economic Development and Innovation, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, the Brazilian Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation, Russian Foundation for Basic Research, the Leverhulme Trust, the Research Corporation, Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), Taiwan, and the Kavli Foundation. The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the NSF, STFC, MPS, INFN, CNRS and the State of Niedersachsen, Germany, for provision of computational resources. This article has been assigned the document numbers LIGO-P150914 and VIR-0015A-16.

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