2004/09/15 by M. Kramer, M. Krämer, D. C. Backer +5 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #Radio Astronomy Observations and Technology #astro-ph #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/j.newar.2004.09.020
published as New Astron.Rev.48:993-1002,2004; PoS MRU:020,2007 · SKA-Key Science Project, to appear in "Science with the Square Kilometer Array," eds.C. Carilli and S. Rawlings, New Astronomy Reviews (Elsevier: Amsterdam)', 10 pages, 2 figures
arxiv created 2004/09/15 · openalex publication_date 2004/12/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2021/02/01 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
The sensitivity of the SKA enables a number of tests of theories of gravity. A Galactic Census of pulsars will discover most of the active pulsars in the Galaxy beamed toward us. In this census will almost certainly be pulsar-black hole binaries as well as pulsars orbiting the super-massive black hole in the Galactic centre. These systems are unique in their capability to probe the ultra-strong field limit of relativistic gravity. These measurements can be used to test the Cosmic Censorship Conjecture and the No-Hair theorem. The large number of millisecond pulsars discovered with the SKA will also provide a dense array of precision clocks on the sky. These clocks will act as the multiple arms of a huge gravitational wave detector, which can be used to detect and measure the stochastic cosmological gravitational wave background that is expected from a number of sources.