inspiral_range

gwpy.astro.inspiral_range(psd, snr=8, mass1=1.4, mass2=1.4, fmin=None, fmax=None, horizon=False)[source]

Calculate the inspiral sensitive distance from a GW strain PSD

The method returns the distance (in megaparsecs) to which an compact binary inspiral with the given component masses would be detectable given the instrumental PSD. The calculation is as defined in:

https://dcc.ligo.org/LIGO-T030276/public

Parameters:

psd : FrequencySeries

the instrumental power-spectral-density data

snr : float, optional

the signal-to-noise ratio for which to calculate range, default: 8

mass1 : float, Quantity, optional

the mass (float assumed in solar masses) of the first binary component, default: 1.4

mass2 : float, Quantity, optional

the mass (float assumed in solar masses) of the second binary component, default: 1.4

fmin : float, optional

the lower frequency cut-off of the integral, default: psd.df

fmax : float, optional

the maximum frequency limit of the integral, defaults to innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO) frequency

horizon : bool, optional

if True, return the maximal ‘horizon’ sensitive distance, otherwise return the angle-averaged range, default: False

Returns:

range : Quantity

the calculated inspiral range [Mpc]

Examples

Grab some data for LIGO-Livingston around GW150914 and generate a PSD

>>> from gwpy.timeseries import TimeSeries
>>> hoft = TimeSeries.fetch_open_data('H1', 1126259446, 1126259478)
>>> hoff = hoft.psd(fftlength=4)

Now we can calculate the inspiral_range():

>>> from gwpy.astro import inspiral_range
>>> r = inspiral_range(hoff, fmin=30)
>>> print(r)
70.4612102889 Mpc