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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
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2026
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| Online Access: | https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.05512 |
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| _version_ | 1866911654796591104 |
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| author | Zheng, Qinyuan Larsen, Bjorn Eisenberg, Ellis Mingarelli, Chiara M. F. |
| author_facet | Zheng, Qinyuan Larsen, Bjorn Eisenberg, Ellis Mingarelli, Chiara M. F. |
| contents | We develop a unified framework for testing gravity beyond General Relativity (GR) with continuous gravitational waves (CWs) from individual supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs). These long-lived, nearly monochromatic nanohertz signals offer unique strengths for precision tests of gravity, since their coherent phase evolution and inter-pulsar correlations in pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) retain detailed information about departures from GR over cosmological propagation distances. We consider three representative classes of deviations from GR: additional polarization states, modified dispersion relations, and parity-violating birefringence. For each, we derive the inter-pulsar cross correlation, the modified antenna response, and the propagation-induced pulsar-term phase delay. For non-tensorial polarizations, the CW cross correlation scales linearly in the alternative-polarization amplitude, compared to the quadratic scaling of the gravitational-wave background (GWB), provided the beyond-GR modes are sub-dominant. PTAs are also competitive for modified dispersion relations, where low frequencies enhance both the antenna-pattern modification and the pulsar-term phase delay. Birefringence, by contrast, is suppressed at nanohertz frequencies for most parity-violating theories. We validate the framework with injection-and-recovery simulations for breathing-mode and massive-graviton signals at current observational limits, recovering the injected beyond-GR parameters and distinguishing the CW signal from both correlated and uncorrelated background models. We further show that a pure-GR CW template recovers source parameters without significant bias when beyond-GR physics is present in the data, supporting a two-stage analysis strategy: identify candidates under GR, then test for deviations. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_05512 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2026 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Testing General Relativity with Individual Supermassive Black Hole Binaries Zheng, Qinyuan Larsen, Bjorn Eisenberg, Ellis Mingarelli, Chiara M. F. General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena We develop a unified framework for testing gravity beyond General Relativity (GR) with continuous gravitational waves (CWs) from individual supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs). These long-lived, nearly monochromatic nanohertz signals offer unique strengths for precision tests of gravity, since their coherent phase evolution and inter-pulsar correlations in pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) retain detailed information about departures from GR over cosmological propagation distances. We consider three representative classes of deviations from GR: additional polarization states, modified dispersion relations, and parity-violating birefringence. For each, we derive the inter-pulsar cross correlation, the modified antenna response, and the propagation-induced pulsar-term phase delay. For non-tensorial polarizations, the CW cross correlation scales linearly in the alternative-polarization amplitude, compared to the quadratic scaling of the gravitational-wave background (GWB), provided the beyond-GR modes are sub-dominant. PTAs are also competitive for modified dispersion relations, where low frequencies enhance both the antenna-pattern modification and the pulsar-term phase delay. Birefringence, by contrast, is suppressed at nanohertz frequencies for most parity-violating theories. We validate the framework with injection-and-recovery simulations for breathing-mode and massive-graviton signals at current observational limits, recovering the injected beyond-GR parameters and distinguishing the CW signal from both correlated and uncorrelated background models. We further show that a pure-GR CW template recovers source parameters without significant bias when beyond-GR physics is present in the data, supporting a two-stage analysis strategy: identify candidates under GR, then test for deviations. |
| title | Testing General Relativity with Individual Supermassive Black Hole Binaries |
| topic | General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.05512 |