First Search for Gravitational Waves from Known Pulsars with Advanced LIGO

Abstract

We present the result of searches for gravitational waves from 200 pulsars using data from the first observing run ofthe Advanced LIGO detectors. We find no significant evidence for a gravitational-wave signal from any of thesepulsars, but we are able to set the most constraining upper limits yet on their gravitational-wave amplitudes andellipticities. For eight of these pulsars, our upper limits give bounds that are improvements over the indirect spindownlimit values. For another 32, we are within a factor of 10 of the spin-down limit, and it is likely that some ofthese will be reachable in future runs of the advanced detector. Taken as a whole, these new results improve onprevious limits by more than a factor of two.