Recent searches for continuous gravitational waves

Understand

Gravitational wave astronomy opened dramatically in September 2015 with the LIGO discovery of a distant and massive binary black hole coalescence.

• The more recent discovery of a binary neutron star merger, followed by a gamma ray burst and a kilonova, reinforces the excitement of this new era, in which we may soon see other sources of gravitational waves, including continuous, nearly monochromatic signals.
• Potential continuous wave (CW) sources include rapidly spinning galactic neutron stars and more exotic possibilities, such as emission from axion Bose Einstein "clouds" surrounding black holes.
• Recent searches in Advanced LIGO data are presented, and prospects for more sensitive future searches discussed.