Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Enhanced Detection Efficiencies And Reduced False Alarms In Searching For Gravitational Waves From Core Collapse Supernovae, Gaukhar Nurbek

Theses and Dissertations

A supernova is a star that flares up very suddenly and then slowly returns to its former luminosity or, explodes violently with energy $10^{52}$ erg. There are stars which are 10 times or more massive than the Sun, which usually end their lives going supernova. When there is no longer enough fuel for the fusion process in the core of the star and inward gravitational pull of the star’s great mass takes place, the star starts to explode. A series of nuclear reactions starts taking place after the star begins shrinking due to gravity. In the final phase of this …

Studies In Gravitational-Wave Astronomy And Tests Of General Relativity, Hong Qi

Theses and Dissertations

Modern astronomical data sets provide the opportunity to test our physical theories of the Universe at unprecedented levels of accuracy. This dissertation examines approaches to testing gravitational theories using a) observations of stars orbiting the center of the Milky Way; b) observations of the pulsations of Cepheid variable stars in dwarf galaxies; and c) gravitational-wave observations of compact binary mergers.

Observations of stars orbiting the center of the Milky Way have been used to infer the mass of the putative black hole that exists there. I discuss how well present and future measurements of stellar orbits can constrain the black …