Possible causes of false general relativity violations in gravitational wave observations

Gupta, Anuradha, Arun, K. G., Barausse, Enrico, Bernard, Laura, Berti, Emanuele, Bhat, Sajad A., Buonanno, Alessandra, Cardoso, Vitor, Cheung, Shun Yin, Clarke, Teagan A., Datta, Sayantani, Dhani, Arnab, Ezquiaga, Jose María, Gupta, Ish, Guttman, Nir, Hinderer, Tanja, Hu, Qian, Janquart, Justin, Johnson-McDaniel, Nathan, Kashyap, Rahul, Krishnendu, N. V., Lasky, Paul D., Lundgren, Andrew, Maggio, Elisa, Mahapatra, Parthapratim, Maselli, Andrea, Narayan, Purnima, Nielsen, Alex B., Nuttall, Laura K., Pani, Paolo, Passenger, Lachlan, Payne, Ethan, Pompili, Lorenzo, Reali, Luca, Saini, Pankaj, Samajdar, Anuradha, Tiwari, Shubhanshu, Tong, Hui, Van Den Broeck, Chris, Yagi, Kent, Yang, Huan, Yunes, Nicolas and Sathyaprakash, B. S. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3845-7586 2025. Possible causes of false general relativity violations in gravitational wave observations. SciPost Physics Community Reports , 5. 10.21468/scipostphyscommrep.5

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Abstract

General relativity (GR) has proven to be a highly successful theory of gravity since its inception. The theory has thrivingly passed numerous experimental tests, predominantly in weak gravity, low relative speeds, and linear regimes, but also in the strong-field and very low-speed regimes with binary pulsars. Observable gravitational waves (GWs) originate from regions of spacetime where gravity is extremely strong, making them a unique tool for testing GR, in previously inaccessible regions of large curvature, relativistic speeds, and strong gravity. Since their first detection, GWs have been extensively used to test GR, but no deviations have been found so far. Given GR’s tremendous success in explaining current astronomical observations and laboratory experiments, accepting any deviation from it requires a very high level of statistical confidence and consistency of the deviation across GW sources. In this paper, we compile a comprehensive list of potential causes that can lead to a false identification of a GR violation in standard tests of GR on data from current and future ground-based GW detectors. These causes include detector noise, signal overlaps, gaps in the data, detector calibration, source model inaccuracy, missing physics in the source and in the underlying environment model, source misidentification, and mismodeling of the astrophysical population. We also provide a rough estimate of when each of these causes will become important for tests of GR for different detector sensitivities. We argue that each of these causes should be thoroughly investigated, quantified, and ruled out before claiming a GR violation in GW observations.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Published
Schools:	Schools > Physics and Astronomy
Additional Information:	License information from Publisher: LICENSE 1: URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, Start Date: 2025-02-13
Publisher:	SciPost Foundation
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	24 February 2025
Date of Acceptance:	18 February 2025
Last Modified:	24 Feb 2025 16:15
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/176432

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