High-time resolution search for compact objects using fast radio burst gravitational lens interferometry with CHIME/FRB

Abstract

The gravitational field of compact objects, such as primordial black holes, can create multiple images of background sources. For transients such as fast radio bursts (FRBs), these multiple images can be resolved in the time domain. Under certain circumstances, these images not only have similar burst morphologies but are also phase-coherent at the electric field level. With a novel dechannelization algorithm and a matched filtering technique, we search for repeated copies of the same electric field waveform in observations of FRBs detected by the FRB backend of the Canadian Hydrogen Mapping Intensity Experiment (CHIME). An interference fringe from a coherent gravitational lensing signal will appear in the time-lag domain as a statistically significant peak in the time-lag autocorrelation function. We calibrate our statistical significance using telescope data containing no FRB signal. Our dataset consists of ∼100-ms long recordings of voltage data from 172 FRB events, dechannelized to 1.25-ns time resolution. This coherent search algorithm allows us to search for gravitational lensing signatures from compact objects in the mass range of 10−4–104 M⊙. After ruling out an anomalous candidate due to diffractive scintillation, we find no significant detections of gravitational lensing in the 172 FRB events that have been analyzed. In a companion work [C. Leung and Z. Kader, Phys. Rev. D 106, 043017 (2022).], we interpret the constraints on dark matter from this search.6 MoreReceived 14 April 2022Accepted 15 June 2022DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.106.043016© 2022 American Physical SocietyPhysics Subject Headings (PhySH)Research AreasGravitational lensesMassive compact halo objectsRadio, microwave, & sub-mm astronomyTransient & explosive astronomical phenomenaGravitation, Cosmology & Astrophysics