Sco X-1 is the brightest X-ray source (excluding the sun) in the sky, and is potentially also the brightest source of continuous gravitational waves. Chris Messenger led a multi-year project aimed at determining the relative benefits of a number of search algorithms that will likely be applied to aLIGO data. The mock-data challenge provided simulated data including signals at a range of strains, and each algorithm then attempted to find the signals. Encouragingly, the faintest detected signal is only a factor of two stronger than the estimated torque balance limit, which indicates that this limit may be beaten with improved algorithms, data, and also perhaps system parameter precision.

Read the paper (arXiv:1504.05889)

Labels: 2015, gravitational waves