Temporal correlation statistic for intrinsic phase fluctuation in double white dwarf gravitational-wave signals
Phys. Rev. D 114, 023012 – Published 8 July, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/dcdn-gl9v
Abstract
We present a framework to probe intrinsic stochastic fluctuation in the orbital phase evolution of long-lived double white dwarf binaries through gravitational-wave observations with LISA. To capture the essential structure of the fluctuation, we introduce a minimal quadratic statistic that isolates its temporal correlation. We derive a simple analytic scaling relation for the signal-to-noise ratio of this correlation statistic, explicitly showing its dependence on the total observation time and the intrinsic phase correlation time.