Modifications to the signal from a gravitational wave event due to a surrounding shell of matter

In previous work, we established theoretical results concerning the effect of matter shells surrounding a gravitational wave (GW) source, and we now apply these results to astrophysical scenarios. Firstly, it is shown that GW echoes that are claimed to be present in LIGO data of certain events, could not have been caused by a matter shell. However, it is also shown that there are scenarios in which matter shells could make modifications of order a few percent to a GW signal; these scenarios include binary black hole mergers, binary neutron star mergers, and core collapse supernovae.

Automated summary

The study shows that the claimed GW echoes in LIGO data could not have been caused by matter shells, but in certain scenarios, matter shells can make modifications of a few percent to GW signals.