From Black Holes to the Big Bang: Astrophysics and Cosmology with Gravitational Waves and their Electromagnetic Counterparts

The growing catalog of gravitational-wave signals from compact object mergers has allowed us to study the properties of black holes and neutron stars more precisely than ever before and has opened a new window through which to probe the earliest moments in our universe’s history. Population-level measurements of the masses and spins of compact objects can reveal how these systems form and evolve. Multi- messenger observations of compact object mergers can shed light on the properties of the electromagnetic counterparts of these systems, such as short gamma-ray bursts and kilonovae. Finally, observations of the stochastic gravitational-wave background can constrain early-universe physics inaccessible with other means. In this thesis, I demonstrate how we can leverage such observations of gravitational waves and their electromagnetic counterparts to learn about astrophysics and cosmology. The first part focuses on methods for facilitating the detection of electromagnetic counterparts and the simultaneous analysis of gravitational-wave and electromagnetic data for mergers including a neutron star. I then transition to a detailed study of black hole spin, including characterizing the measurability of spin in individual systems with current gravitational-wave detectors and presenting novel population-level analyses. This work is complemented by the development of new methods for increasingly detailed gravitational-wave data analysis. Such analyses will be critical to the astrophysical interpretation of the growing catalog of compact-object binaries and will enable the future detection of the cosmological stochastic gravitational-wave background.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctoral

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2023

Author dc:creator

• Biscoveanu, Andrea Sylvia

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Vitale, Salvatore

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
• Copyright retained by author(s)

Licence dc:rights.uri

• https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-EDU/1.0/

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/152553

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/152553