Narrow-band search of continuous gravitational-wave signals from Crab and Vela pulsars in Virgo VSR4 data

Creators: Aasi, J.; Abbott, B. P.; Abbott, R.; Abernathy, M. R.; Adhikari, R. X.; Anderson, S. B.; Arai, K.; Araya, M. C.; Barayoga, J. C.; Barish, B. C.; Billingsley, G.; Blackburn, J. K.; Bork, R.; Brooks, A. F.; Cepeda, C.; Chakraborty, R.; Chalermsongsak, T.; Coyne, D. C.; Dergachev, V.; Driggers, J. C.; Ehrens, P.; Etzel, T.; Gushwa, K.; Gustafson, E. K.; Hall, E. D.; Heptonstall, A. W.; Hodge, K. A.; Jacobson, M.; Kanner, J. B.; Kells, W.; Kondrashov, V.; Korth, W. Z.; Kozak, D. B.; Lazzarini, A.; Lewis, J.; Li, T. G. F.; Libbrecht, K.; Mageswaran, M.; Mailand, K.; Maros, E.; Martynov, D.; Marx, J. N.; McIntyre, G.; Meshkov, S.; Nash, T.; Osthelder, C.; Pedraza, M.; Phelps, M.; Price, L. R.; Privitera, S.; Quintero, E.; Raymond, V.; Reitze, D. H.; Rollins, J. G.; Sachdev, S.; Sannibale, V.; Schmidt, P.; Shao, Z.; Singer, A.; Singer, L.; Smith, M. R.; Smith, R. J. E.; Smith-Lefebvre, N. D.; Taylor, R.; Thirugnanasambandam, M. P.; Thrane, E.; Torrie, C. I.; Vajente, G.; Vass, S.; Wallace, L.; Weinstein, A. J.; Williams, R.; Yamamoto, H.; Zhang, L.; Zweizig, J.; Chen, Y.; Cutler, C.; Gossan, S.; Nissanke, S.; Thorne, K. S.; Vallisneri, M.; LIGO Scientific Collaboration; Virgo Collaboration

Abstract

In this paper we present the results of a coherent narrow-band search for continuous gravitational-wave signals from the Crab and Vela pulsars conducted on Virgo VSR4 data. In order to take into account a possible small mismatch between the gravitational-wave frequency and two times the star rotation frequency, inferred from measurement of the electromagnetic pulse rate, a range of 0.02 Hz around two times the star rotational frequency has been searched for both the pulsars. No evidence for a signal has been found and 95% confidence level upper limits have been computed assuming both that polarization parameters are completely unknown and that they are known with some uncertainty, as derived from x-ray observations of the pulsar wind torii. For Vela the upper limits are comparable to the spin-down limit, computed assuming that all the observed spin-down is due to the emission of gravitational waves. For Crab the upper limits are about a factor of 2 below the spin-down limit, and represent a significant improvement with respect to past analysis. This is the first time the spin-down limit is significantly overcome in a narrow-band search.

Additional Information

© 2015 American Physical Society. Received 7 November 2014; published 21 January 2015. The authors thank the anonymous referee for the careful reading of the manuscript. They also gratefully acknowledge the support of the United States National Science Foundation for the construction and operation of the LIGO Laboratory, the Science and Technology Facilities Council of the United Kingdom, the Max-Planck Society, and the State of Niedersachsen/Germany for support of the construction and operation of the GEO600 detector, and the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare and the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique for the construction and operation of the Virgo detector. The authors also gratefully acknowledge the support of the research by these agencies and by the Australian Research Council, the International Science Linkages program of the Commonwealth of Australia, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research of India, the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare of Italy, the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, the Conselleria d'Economia Hisenda i Innovació of the Govern de les Illes Balears, the Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research, the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education, the FOCUS Programme of Foundation for Polish Science, the Royal Society, the Scottish Funding Council, the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance, The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, OTKA of Hungary, 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, the Carnegie Trust, the Leverhulme Trust, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Research Corporation, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

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Published - PhysRevD.91.022004.pdf

Submitted - 1410.8310v1.pdf

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