Effect of noise characterization on the detection of mHz stochastic gravitational waves
gr-qc, astro-ph.CO
Submitted: 2026-01-27
Updated: 2026-09-09
Comments: 20 pages, 6 figures
DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2026/09/054
Code: https://github.com/mikekatz04/Eryn
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
The gist: Pulsar timing arrays' hint for a stochastic gravitational-wave background (SGWB) leverages the expectations of a future detection in the millihertz band, particularly with the LISA space mission.
Terminology
Abstract
Pulsar timing arrays' hint for a stochastic gravitational-wave background (SGWB) leverages the expectations of a future detection in the millihertz band, particularly with the LISA space mission. However, finding an SGWB with a single orbiting detector is challenging: It calls for cautious modelling of instrumental noise, which is also mainly stochastic. It was shown that agnostic noise reconstruction methods provide robustness in the detection process. We build on previous work to include more realistic instrumental simulations and additional degrees of freedom in the noise inference model and analyze the impact of LISA's sensitivity to SGWBs. Particularly, we model the two main types of noise sources with separate transfer functions and power spectral density spline fitting. We assess the detectability bounds and their dependence on the flexibility of the noise model and on the prior probability, allowing us to refine previously reported results.
Sources
- The NANOGrav 15-year Data Set: Evidence for a Gravitational-Wave Background
- The second data release from the European Pulsar Timing Array III. Search for gravitational wave signals
- Search for an isotropic gravitational-wave background with the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array
- GWTC-4.0: An Introduction to Version 4.0 of the Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalog
- GWTC-4.0: Updating the Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalog with Observations from the First Part of the Fourth LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Observing Run
- Upper Limits on the Isotropic Gravitational-Wave Background from the first part of LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA's fourth Observing Run
- Searching for the nano-Hertz stochastic gravitational wave background with the Chinese Pulsar Timing Array Data Release I
- Uncovering gravitational-wave backgrounds from noises of unknown shape with LISA
- A flexible, GPU-accelerated approach for the joint characterization of LISA instrumental noise and Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds
- Impact of the noise knowledge uncertainty for the science exploitation of cosmological and astrophysical stochastic gravitational wave background with LISA
- A weakly-parametric approach to stochastic background inference in LISA
- On the effectiveness of null TDI channels as instrument noise monitors in LISA
- Discriminating between a Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background and Instrument Noise
- LISA Definition Study Report
- Bayesian power spectral density estimation for LISA noise based on penalized splines with a parametric boost
- Statistical applications of the multivariate skew-normal distribution
- Is your stochastic signal really detectable?
- Assessing the detectability of a Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background with LISA, using an excess of power approach
- Eryn : A multi-purpose sampler for Bayesian inference
- emcee: The MCMC Hammer
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