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Astrophysics, Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics, astro-ph.CO,General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology, gr-qc
Abstract:
One of the primary scientific objectives of the Laser Interferometer Space
Antenna (LISA) is to probe the expansion of the Universe using gravitational
wave observations. Indeed, as gravitational waves from the coalescence of a
massive black hole binary (MBHB) carry direct information of the luminosity
distances, an accompanying electromagnetic (EM) counterpart can be used to
determine the redshift. This method of $bright$ $sirens$ enables one to build a
gravitational Hubble diagram to high redshift when applied to LISA. In this
work, we forecast the ability of LISA-detected MBHB bright sirens to constrain
cosmological models. As the expected EM emission from MBHBs can be detected up
to redshift $z\sim 7$ with future astronomical facilities, we focus on the
ability of LISA to constrain the expansion of the Universe at $z\sim 2-3$, a
poorly charted epoch in cosmography. We find that a model-independent approach
to cosmology based on a spline interpolation of the luminosity
distance-redshift relation, can constrain the Hubble parameter at $z\sim2-3$
with a relative precision of at least $10\%$.
