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arXiv · 1811.04904

Parameter estimation for black hole echo signals and their statistical significance

Alex B. Nielsen·Collin D. Capano·Ofek Birnholtz·Julian Westerweck
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Abstract

Searching for black hole echo signals with gravitational waves provides a means of probing the near-horizon regime of these objects. We demonstrate a pipeline to efficiently search for these signals in gravitational wave data and calculate model selection probabilities between signal and no-signal hypotheses. As an example of its use we calculate Bayes factors for the Abedi-Dykaar-Afshordi (ADA) model on events in LIGO's first observing run and compare to existing results in the literature. We discuss the benefits of using a full likelihood exploration over existing search methods that used template banks and calculated p-values. We use the waveforms of ADA, although the method is easily extendable to other waveforms. With these waveforms we are able to demonstrate a range of echo amplitudes that is already is ruled out by the data.

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Alex B. Nielsen, Collin D. Capano, Ofek Birnholtz, Julian Westerweck. 2018-11-12. Parameter estimation for black hole echo signals and their statistical significance. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.99.104012

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