Follow-up Analyses to the O3 LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Lensing Searches

Understand

Along their path from source to observer, gravitational waves may be gravitationally lensed by massive objects.

• This results in distortions of the observed signal which can be used to extract new information about fundamental physics, astrophysics, and cosmology.
• Searches for these distortions amongst the observed signals from the current detector network have already been carried out, though there have as yet been no confident detections.
• However, predictions of the observation rate of lensing suggest detection in the future is a realistic possibility.