: Is the graviton massless? This problem was addressed in the literature at a phenomenological level, using modified dispersion relations for gravitational waves, in linearized calculations around flat space. Here, we perform a detailed analysis of the gravitational waveform produced when a small particle plunges or inspirals into a large nonspinning black hole. Our results should presumably also describe the gravitational collapse to black holes and explosive events such as supernovae. In the context of a theory with massive gravitons and screening, merging objects up to 1 Gpc away or collapsing stars in the nearby galaxy may be used to constrain the mass of the graviton to be smaller than ∼10^{-23}  eV, with low-frequency detectors. Our results suggest that the absence of dipolar gravitational waves from black hole binaries may be used to rule out entirely such theories.

Gravitational Waves in Massive Gravity Theories: Waveforms, Fluxes, and Constraints from Extreme-Mass-Ratio Mergers

Maselli, Andrea
2018-01-01

Abstract

: Is the graviton massless? This problem was addressed in the literature at a phenomenological level, using modified dispersion relations for gravitational waves, in linearized calculations around flat space. Here, we perform a detailed analysis of the gravitational waveform produced when a small particle plunges or inspirals into a large nonspinning black hole. Our results should presumably also describe the gravitational collapse to black holes and explosive events such as supernovae. In the context of a theory with massive gravitons and screening, merging objects up to 1 Gpc away or collapsing stars in the nearby galaxy may be used to constrain the mass of the graviton to be smaller than ∼10^{-23}  eV, with low-frequency detectors. Our results suggest that the absence of dipolar gravitational waves from black hole binaries may be used to rule out entirely such theories.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12571/30975
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