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Free keywords:
General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology, gr-qc, Astrophysics, Solar and Stellar Astrophysics, astro-ph.SR
Abstract:
A strategy is devised for a semi-coherent cross-correlation search for a
young neutron star in the supernova remnant SNR 1987A, using science data from
the Initial LIGO and/or Virgo detectors. An astrophysical model for the
gravitational wave phase is introduced which describes the star's spin down in
terms of its magnetic field strength $B$ and ellipticity $\epsilon$, instead of
its frequency derivatives. The model accurately tracks the gravitational wave
phase from a rapidly decelerating neutron star under the restrictive but
computationally unavoidable assumption of constant braking index, an issue
which has hindered previous searches for such young objects. The theoretical
sensitivity is calculated and compared to the indirect, age-based wave strain
upper limit. The age-based limit lies above the detection threshold in the
frequency band 75\,Hz $\lesssim \nu \lesssim 450$\,Hz. The semi-coherent phase
metric is also calculated and used to estimate the optimal search template
spacing for the search. The range of search parameters that can be covered
given our computational resources ($\sim 10^9$ templates) is also estimated.
For Initial LIGO sensitivity, in the frequency band between 50\,Hz and 500\,Hz,
in the absence of a detected signal, we should be able to set limits of $B
\gtrsim 10^{11}$\,G and $\epsilon \lesssim 10^{-4}$.