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Abstract

We present a search for gravitational waves from merging binary neutron stars
which have non-negligible eccentricity as they enter the LIGO observing band.
We use the public Advanced LIGO data which covers the period from 2015 through
2017 and contains $\sim164$ days of LIGO-Hanford and LIGO-Livingston coincident
observing time. The search was conducted using matched-filtering using the
PyCBC toolkit. We find no significant binary neutron star candidates beyond
GW170817, which has previously been reported by searches for binaries in
circular orbits. We place a 90% upper limit of $\sim1700$ mergers
$\textrm{Gpc}^{-3} \textrm{Yr}^{-1}$ for eccentricities $\lesssim 0.43$ at a
dominant-mode gravitational-wave frequency of 10 Hz. The absence of a detection
with these data is consistent with theoretical predictions of eccentric binary
neutron star merger rates. Using our measured rate we estimate the sensitive
volume of future gravitational-wave detectors and compare this to theoretical
rate predictions. We find that, in the absence of a prior detection, the rate
limits set by six months of Cosmic Explorer observations would constrain all
current plausible models of eccentric binary neutron star formation.