Gravitational-wave astronomy

This is a web page for the 2012 MPAGS module on gravitational-wave astronomy. The course will consist of 5 lectures with accompanying assignments:

• Lecture 1: Introduction, history, and back-of-the-envelope derivations
  Assignment 1.
  
• Lecture 2: Detectors and detection
  Assignment 2.
  (Lecture notes for Lecture 2 are available -- warning, 16 MB file)
  
• Lecture 3: Sources
  
• Lecture 4: Compact binaries: waveforms and parameter estimation
  Assignment 3.
  
• Lecture 5: The future of gravitational-wave astronomy
  

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Useful references:

• Bernard Schutz. Gravitational waves on the back of an envelope
• Roger Blandford and Kip Thorne. Applications of Classical Physics (see chapters 23-26)
• Kip Thorne. Gravitational Waves -- A Web-Based Course
• Cole Miller. The Astrophysics of Gravitational Wave Sources
• LIGO website
• Reading lists for BiG Waves 1 and BiG Waves 2
• Textbooks: Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler; Wald; Schutz; Dirac; ...

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For use in sample exercises:
Advanced LIGO PSDs
Excercise description
Files: Sinusoid.dat, NoisySinusoid.dat, Noise.dat, Data2013.dat, Challenge2013.dat

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Last edited by Ilya Mandel on August 2, 2013.