Constraining scalar-tensor theories from higher harmonics with GW230529

Abstract

The Advanced LIGO and Virgo collaborations recently detected a gravitational wave event, GW230529\_181500, during the fourth observing run, which is most plausibly attributed to the merger of a neutron star and a black hole. This observation provides an opportunity to test a class of gravitational theories that deviate from general relativity. In such theories, additional terms contribute to the gravitational wave signal only in cases of asymmetric binaries. This study focuses on two scalar-tensor models within this class of theories: the Screened Modified Gravity and Brans-Dicke theory. These models have potential applications in areas such as dark matter, dark energy, cosmic inflation, and primordial nucleosynthesis. With the GW230529\_181500 and Bayesian Markov-chain Monte Carlo analyses, we derive a 90\% credible lower bound as $ \frac{\varphi_{\rm_{VEV}}}{M_{\rm Pl}}<1.7\times10^{-2}$ and $\omega_{\rm BD}>25.12$ by using dominant mode correction. Asymmetric binary systems usually have a significant mass ratio, in such cases, higher harmonic modes cannot be neglected. Our work considers higher harmonic corrections from scalar-tensor theories and provides a tighter constraint of $ \frac{\varphi_{\rm_{VEV}}}{M_{\rm Pl}}<1.5\times10^{-2}$ and $\omega_{\rm BD}>32.68$, with a 13.3\% and 30.1\% improvement respectively. Combining GW230529\_181500, GW200115 and GW190814 and including higher modes, the constraint is improved to $\frac{\varphi_{\rm_{VEV}}}{M_{\rm Pl}}<7.84\times10^{-3}$ and $\omega_{\rm BD}>123.75$. This is currently the strongest constraint from GWs, contingent upon GW190814 being an NSBH event.