No slip gravity in light of LISA standard sirens

Abstract

ABSTRACT Standard sirens (SS) are the gravitational wave analogue of the astronomical standard candles, and can provide powerful information about the dynamics of the Universe up to very high z values. In this work, we generate three mock SS catalogues based on the merger of massive black hole binaries which are expected to be observed in the LISA operating frequency band. Then, we perform an analysis to test modifications of general relativity (GR) inspired by the no slip gravity framework. We find that in the best scenarios, we can constrain the free parameters which quantify deviations from GR to 21 per cent accuracy, while the Hubble parameter can be simultaneously fit to 6 per cent accuracy. In combination with CMB information, we find a 15 per cent accuracy on the modified gravity free parameters and 0.7 per cent accuracy on the Hubble parameter. The SS events at very large cosmological distances to be observed in LISA band will provide a unique way to test nature of gravity, but in the context of the analysis performed here, it will not be possible to distinguish the no slip gravity from GR.