Adding electromagnetic birefringence to pulsar timing and astrometry to detect gravitational waves
Abstract
It was recently shown that the time variation of the polarization of electromagnetic waves from pulsars can be used, in cross-correlation with pulsar timing, to probe the chirality of an isotropic gravitational wave background. Here, we show that the expression for the cross-correlation is derived efficiently with the total-angular-momentum formalism and use this framework to extend the formulation to cross-correlation with astrometry. We do so for spin-1 gravitational waves (that may arise in alternative-gravity theories) as well as the general-relativistic spin-2 gravitational waves.
Fields of Study & Subjects
Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research
Cosmology and Gravitation Theories
Geophysics and Gravity Measurements
Publication details
- Journal / source
- Physical review. D/Physical review. D.
- Volume
- 113
- Issue
- 2
- Publication date
- 12 January 2026
- Language
- EN