Speaker
Description
The rate of GW detections will soar from hundreds to millions per year
as detectors improve, revealing the population properties of BH mergers
in great detail. Such properties encode valuable information about how
stars form and evolve in galaxies very different from our own. They can
provide complementary constraints on the cosmic chemical history and on
star formation in environments that evade electromagnetic observations.
However, the use of GWs in astrophysics presents challenges that must be
overcome to realise their full potential.
In particular, the astrophysical "interpretation challenge" that I will
discuss in my talk. The observable BH merger population contains a
mixture of systems formed throughout the Universe, with different
chemical compositions and in very different environments (allowing for
unique formation channels). Both strongly influence the formation of BH
mergers and can degenerate into their population properties. One aspect
that is key to breaking such degeneracies, and which I will focus on, is
constraining the iron-dependent cosmic star formation history.
