Open AccessNo tension between pulsar timing array upper limits on the nano-Hertz gravitational wave background and assembly models of massive black hole binaries
Author(s) -
H. Middleton,
S. Chen,
W. Del Pozzo,
Alberto Sesana,
A. Vecchio
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
journal of physics. conference series
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.21
H-Index - 85
eISSN - 1742-6596
pISSN - 1742-6588
DOI - 10.1088/1742-6596/1468/1/012214
Subject(s) - gravitational wave , physics , pulsar , hertz , population , gravitational wave background , black hole (networking) , astrophysics , gravitation , limit (mathematics) , astronomy , quantum mechanics , computer science , computer network , mathematical analysis , routing protocol , demography , routing (electronic design automation) , mathematics , sociology , link state routing protocol
Pulsar timing arrays provide a means to observe the nano-Hertz gravitational wave background from the population of merging massive black hole binaries. Observations are placing increasingly stringent upper limits on the gravitational wave background. Upper limits and future detections will enable the study of the properties of the merging population. Recent upper limits have cast doubt on current predictions of the gravitational wave background. Here we perform a Bayesian analysis comparing upper limits to astrophysical prediction. So far models are consistent with observation. These proceedings summarise previous work in Ref. [1].