Narrow-band search of continuous gravitational-wave signals from Crab and Vela pulsars in Virgo VSR4 data

Aasi, J. and Abbott, B. P. and Abbott, R. and Abbott, T. and Abernathy, M. R. and Acernese, F. and Ackley, K. and Adams, C. and Adams, T. and Adams, T. and Addesso, P. and Adhikari, R. X. and Adya, V. and Affeldt, C. and Agathos, M. and Agatsuma, K. and Aggarwal, N. and Aguiar, O. D. and Ain, A. and Ajith, P. and Alemic, A. and Allen, B. and Allocca, A. and Amariutei, D. and Anderson, S. B. and Anderson, W. G. and Arai, K. and Araya, M. C. and Arceneaux, C. and Areeda, J. S. and Bojtos, István Péter and Debreczeni, Gergely and Frei, Zsolt and Gergely, Árpád László and Gondán, László and Nagy-Egri, Máté Ferenc and Rácz, István and Raffai, Péter and Szeifert, Gábor and Tápai, Márton and Vasúth, Mátyás Zsolt (2015) Narrow-band search of continuous gravitational-wave signals from Crab and Vela pulsars in Virgo VSR4 data. PHYSICAL REVIEW D, 91 (2). ISSN 2470-0010

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Abstract

In this paper we present the results of a coherent narrow-band search for continuous gravitational-wave signals from the Crab and Vela pulsars conducted on Virgo VSR4 data. In order to take into account a possible small mismatch between the gravitational-wave frequency and two times the star rotation frequency, inferred from measurement of the electromagnetic pulse rate, a range of 0.02 Hz around two times the star rotational frequency has been searched for both the pulsars. No evidence for a signal has been found and 95% confidence level upper limits have been computed assuming both that polarization parameters are completely unknown and that they are known with some uncertainty, as derived from x-ray observations of the pulsar wind torii. For Vela the upper limits are comparable to the spin-down limit, computed assuming that all the observed spin-down is due to the emission of gravitational waves. For Crab the upper limits are about a factor of 2 below the spin-down limit, and represent a significant improvement with respect to past analysis. This is the first time the spin-down limit is significantly overcome in a narrow-band search.

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