Gravitational Wave Radiation from Newborn Accreting Magnetars

Abstract

Abstract The observed electromagnetic radiation from some long and short gamma-ray bursts, and neutron stars (NSs), and the theoretical models proposed to interpret these observations together point to a very interesting but confusing problem, namely, whether fall-back accretion could lead to dipole field decay of newborn NSs. In this paper, we investigate the gravitational wave (GW) radiation of newborn magnetars with a fall-back disk formed in both the core-collapse of massive stars and the merger of binary NSs. We make a comparison of the results obtained with and without fall-back accretion-induced dipole-field decay (FADD) involved. Depending on the fall-back parameters, initial parameters of newborn magnetars, and models used to describe FADD, FADD may indeed occur in newborn magnetars. Because of the low dipole fields caused by FADD, the newborn magnetars will be spun up to higher frequencies and have larger masses in comparison with the non-decay cases. Thus the GW radiation of newborn accreting magnetars would be remarkably enhanced. We propose that observation of GW signals from newborn magnetars using future GW detectors may help to reveal whether FADD could occur in newborn accreting magnetars. Our model is also applied to the discussion of the remnant of GW170817. From the post-merger GW searching results of Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo we cannot confirm the remnant is a low-dipole-field long-lived NS. Future detection of GWs from GW170817-like events using more sensitive detectors may help to clarify the FADD puzzle.