SOAP: A generalised application of the Viterbi algorithm to searches for continuous gravitational-wave signals

Understand

All-sky and wide parameter space searches for continuous gravitational waves are generally template-matching schemes which test a bank of signal waveforms against data from a gravitational wave detector.

• Such searches can offer optimal sensitivity for a given computing cost and signal model, but are highly-tuned to specific signal types and are computationally expensive, even for semi-coherent searches.
• We have developed a search method based on the well-known Viterbi algorithm which is model-agnostic and has a computational cost several orders of magnitude lower than template methods, with a modest reduction in sensitivity.
• In particular, this method can search for signals which have an unknown frequency evolution.