articlePhysical review. D/Physical review. D.Jan 19, 2024GREEN OA

What is the source of the PTA GW signal?

JEJohn EllisMFMalcolm FairbairnGFGabriele FrancioliniGHGert HütsiAJAntonio J. Iovino

King's College London · National Institute of Chemical Physics and Biophysics · +7 more institutions

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Abstract

The most conservative interpretation of the nHz stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB) discovered by NANOGrav and other pulsar timing array (PTA) collaborations is astrophysical, namely that it originates from supermassive black hole (SMBH) binaries. However, alternative cosmological models have been proposed, including cosmic strings, phase transitions, domain walls, primordial fluctuations, and ``audible'' axions. We perform a multimodel analysis (MMA) to compare how well these different hypotheses fit the NANOGrav data, both in isolation and in combination with SMBH binaries, and address the questions: Which interpretations fit the data best, and which are disfavored? We also discuss experimental…

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161
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Authors

10

Topics & keywords

Topics
Keywords
  • Gravitational wave
  • Physics
  • Pulsar
  • Supermassive black hole
  • Axion
  • SIGNAL (programming language)
  • Astrophysics
  • Gravitational wave background
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