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Abstract

Gravitational waves searches for compact binary mergers with LIGO and Virgo
are presently a two stage process. First, a gravitational wave signal is
identified. Then, an exhaustive search over signal parameters is performed. The
identification stage must be efficient in order to maximize the number of
gravitational wave sources that are identified. Initial identification of
gravitational wave signals with LIGO and Virgo happens in real-time, which
requires that less than one second of computational time must be used for each
second of gravitational wave data collected. In contrast, subsequent parameter
estimation may require hundreds of hours of computational time to analyze the
same one second of gravitational wave data. The real-time identification
requirement necessitates efficient and often approximate methods for signal
analysis. We describe one piece of a real-time gravitational-wave
identification algorithm: an efficient method for ascertaining a signal's
consistency between multiple gravitational wave detectors. This technique was
used in analyses of Advanced LIGO's second observing run and Advanced Virgo's
first observing run.