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Spectral Sirens: Cosmology from the Full Mass Distribution of Compact Binaries
Jose María Ezquiaga1, Daniel E Holz1,2
1Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics and Enrico Fermi Institute, The University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA.
Physical Review Letters
|August 26, 2022
Summary
Gravitational-wave events from neutron stars and black holes offer new ways to measure the universe's expansion. Analyzing their mass spectrum, or "spectral sirens," provides precise cosmological constraints, especially with future detectors.
Area of Science:
- Astrophysics
- Cosmology
- Gravitational-wave Astronomy
Background:
- Neutron stars and black holes detected via gravitational waves act as "standard sirens" for measuring cosmic distances.
- Features in compact object mass distributions, like mass gaps, are expected to redshift, offering independent cosmological information.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the use of the entire mass spectrum of compact binary mergers as a cosmological probe.
- To demonstrate how analyzing mass distribution features can break degeneracies between astrophysical and cosmological evolution.
Main Methods:
- Utilizing the mass spectrum of neutron star and black hole mergers, including specific features like the pair instability supernova (PISN) gap and neutron star-black hole gap.
- Comparing the cosmological constraining power of different mass features for current (2G) and future (3G) gravitational-wave detectors.
Main Results:
- The pair instability supernova gap is crucial for current detectors, while the lower mass gap will be more powerful for third-generation observatories.
- The "spectral siren" method, using the full mass distribution, can break degeneracies between mass and cosmological evolution.
- This method promises precision constraints on the Hubble constant (H(z)) and mass distribution evolution.
Conclusions:
- The mass spectrum of compact binary mergers provides a self-calibrating tool for precision cosmology.
- Future gravitational-wave detectors will achieve significant precision in cosmological measurements using this technique.
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