LIGO: The First Detection and Prospects for Multimessenger Astronomy

by Dr Imre Bartos (Columbia University)

Tuesday 7 Jun 2016, 13:15 → 14:15 Europe/Stockholm

FB42

In this talk I will review the first direct detection of gravitational waves announced in February by LIGO, and I will discuss the near and longer-term implications for astronomy. The LIGO observatories discovered gravitational waves from merging black holes in a fraction of their first data taking period last year (O1). Current improvement efforts will increase the detector's sensitivity by ~50% by this summer, while Virgo is also expected to come online later this year. In the meantime, multimessenger efforts are expanding beyond the already significant undertaking during O1. Some of this work, along with significant theoretical efforts are now dedicated to binary black hole mergers, the surprise source multiple of which we are almost certain to see later this year. I will outline the status, plans and prospects of multimessenger observations connected to the second gravitational wave observation run, O2, including electromagnetic and neutrino observations across the energy spectrum. I will focus on what is potentially reachable and what the limitations are for O2, and what we need to pay attention to this year.