Stochastic gravitational wave background from the single-degenerate channel of type Ia supernovae

Abstract

We demonstrate that the integrated gravitational wave signal of type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) in the single-degenerate channel out to cosmological distances gives rise to a continuous background to spaceborne gravitational wave detectors, including the Big Bang Observer and Deci-Hertz Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory planned missions. This gravitational wave background from SNe Ia acts as a noise background in the frequency range 0.1--10 Hz, which heretofore was thought to be relatively free from astrophysical sources apart from neutron-star and white-dwarf binaries, and therefore a key window in which to study primordial gravitational waves generated by inflation. While inflationary energy scales of $\ensuremath{\gtrsim}{10}^{16}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{GeV}$ yield inflationary gravitational wave backgrounds in excess of our range of predicted backgrounds, for lower energy scales of $\ensuremath{\sim}{10}^{15}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{GeV}$, the inflationary gravitational wave background becomes comparable to the noise background from SNe Ia.