Colloq Abstract - Mooley
March 23
11:00am Mountain
Kunal Mooley (Caltech)
The First EM Counterpart of a Gravitational Wave Event
Abstract
On 17 Aug 2017, the scientific community witnessed a historic event. The Advanced LIGO and Advanced VIRGO observatories detected a gravitational wave signal, GW170817, from the inspiral and merger of two neutron stars, and within 12 hours an electromagnetic counterpart was detected at gamma-ray, ultraviolet and optical wavelengths. The merger was localized to spiral galaxy NGC 4993 at a distance of about 40 Mpc. The gamma-rays recorded a faint short burst, while the optical and ultraviolet recorded the first definite detection of a kilonova. The X-rays and radio signals were detected 1-2 weeks after the merger, providing further insights into the relativistic ejecta and the merger environment. Two hundred days after the merger, GW170817 continues to present surprises to astronomers. In this talk I will describe the multi-messenger search and the rich astrophysics uncovered to date.
