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F. A. Jenet (U. Texas at Brownsville)
Radio pulsars offer a unique opportunity to probe the nano-hertz regime of the gravitational wave (G-wave) spectrum. Such low frequency G-waves will provide a wealth of information about galaxy and supermassive black hole binary formation and evolution. The most likely signal detected using pulsar timing will be a stochastic G-wave background generated from an ensemble of supermassive black holes scattered throughout the universe. Techniques are currently being developed to detect such a background. Aside from the background, radio pulsars can place limits on the existence of individual G-wave sources. Using currently available data, limits have been placed on the mass of a recently proposed supermassive black hole system in the radio galaxy 3C 66B.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 36 5
© 2004. The American Astronomical Society.