Joint LIGO/Tapir

Speaker: Lorenzo Cavallo, University of Padova, Italy

Time: 1pm Pacific

Place: in the West Bridge SCR, or on zoom https://caltech.zoom.us/j/82072539167

Title: Gravitational waves from neutron star merges and host galaxies: clues from short-GRBs
Abstract: Recently, the characterization of binary systems of neutron stars has become central in various fields such as gravitational waves (GWs), gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), and the chemical evolution of galaxies. In this talk I will discuss possible observational proxies that can be used to infer some characteristics of the delay time distribution (DTD) of neutron star mergers (NSMs). I will first outline the evolutionary scenarios leading to the production of binary neutron stars (NS); and present general features of models based on binary population synthesis codes. Then I will describe in detail the derivation of semi-analytic delay times distributions based on the stellar evolution theory, meant to capture the major properties of DTDs. After that, I will show how the convolution of these parametric DTDs with star formation histories (SFH) of galaxies in a mock universe allow us to assess the potential of SGRBs demographics to constrain such DTD. In the end, I will elaborate on the possibilities of studying the association of NSM events to the properties of their hosts using only the GW detections, thereby substantially increasing the effectiveness of this method to constrain the DTD of NSMs