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  • Letter
  • Open Access

Searching for cosmic string induced stochastic gravitational wave background with the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array

Ligong Bian1,2,*, Jing Shu3,2,4,5,6,7,†, Bo Wang7, Qiang Yuan8,9,‡, and Junchao Zong10,4

  • 1Department of Physics and Chongqing Key Laboratory for Strongly Coupled Physics, Chongqing University, Chongqing 401331, China
  • 2Center for High Energy Physics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
  • 3School of Physics and State Key Laboratory of Nuclear Physics and Technology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
  • 4CAS Key Laboratory of Theoretical Physics, Institute of Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China
  • 5School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
  • 6School of Fundamental Physics and Mathematical Sciences, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hangzhou 310024, China
  • 7International Centre for Theoretical Physics Asia-Pacific, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100190 Beijing, China
  • 8Key Laboratory of Dark Matter and Space Astronomy, Purple Mountain Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing 210023, China
  • 9School of Astronomy and Space Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China
  • 10Department of Physics, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China

  • *lgbycl@cqu.edu.cn
  • †jshu@pku.edu.cn
  • ‡yuanq@pmo.ac.cn
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Phys. Rev. D 106, L101301 – Published 14 November, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.106.L101301

Abstract

We search for stochastic gravitational wave background emitted from cosmic strings using the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array data over 15 years. While the common power-law excess revealed by several pulsar timing array experiments might be accounted for by the gravitational wave background from cosmic strings, the lack of the characteristic Hellings-Downs correlation cannot establish its physical origin yet. The constraints on the cosmic string model parameters are thus derived with the conservative assumption that the common power-law excess is due to unknown background. Two representative cosmic string models with different loop distribution functions are considered. We obtain constraints on the dimensionless string tension parameter Gμ<10−11–10−10, which is more stringent by two orders of magnitude than that obtained by the high-frequency LIGO-Virgo experiment for one model, and less stringent for the other. The results provide the chance to test the grand unified theories, with the spontaneous symmetry breaking scale of U(1) being two-to-three orders of magnitude below 1016  GeV. The pulsar timing array experiments are thus entirely complementary to the LIGO-Virgo experiment in probing the cosmic strings and the underlying beyond standard model physics in the early Universe.

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Phys. Rev. D 106, L101301– Published 14 November, 2022
  • Received 20 May 2022
  • Accepted 11 October 2022
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

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