Irreducible Gravitational Wave Background as a Particle Detector

[2604.20792] Irreducible Gravitational Wave Background as a Particle Detector Skip to main content Search Submit Donate Log in High Energy Physics - Phenomenology arXiv:2604.20792 (hep-ph) [Submitted on 22 Apr 2026 ( v1 ), last revised 28 Aug 2026 (this version, v3)] Title: Irreducible Gravitational Wave Background as a Particle Detector Authors: Anish Ghoshal , Angus Spalding , Graham White View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract: Beyond the standard model particles can imprint a temporary early matter-dominated epoch on a stochastic gravitational-wave background. For a freely propagating background whose production has ceased, we show that the resulting feature contains two characteristic frequencies that determine the particle decay rate $\Gamma$ and the abundance-weighted mass $Y_iM$, independently of the microphysical origin of the gravitational-wave source. Using numerical scans, we derive semi-analytic relations between these characteristic frequencies and the BSM particle parameters, and quantify the parameter ranges over which these relations remain valid. For backgrounds that remain actively sourced, the end of early matter domination continues to define a source-independent cosmological frequency scale controlled by $\Gamma$, although the second feature, and hence the inference of $Y_iM$, is source dependent. Once a particle model and production mechanism are specified, the measured combinations can be translated into masses and microscopic couplings. Remarkably, decay lengths targeted by upcoming long-lived-particle searches map directly onto the nanohertz range in which NANOGrav has reported evidence for a stochastic gravitational-wave background. Comments: Version 3 accepted for publication in Physical Review D. Corrections have been made to the numerical results in Eqs. (14), (15), and (36) Subjects: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph) ; Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.CO) Cite as: arXiv:2604.20792 [hep-ph] (or arXiv:2604.20792v3 [hep-ph] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2604.20792 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite Submission history From: Angus Spalding [ view email ] [v1] Wed, 22 Apr 2026 17:17:40 UTC (953 KB) [v2] Sat, 6 Jun 2026 11:42:01 UTC (1,152 KB) [v3] Fri, 28 Aug 2026 10:46:13 UTC (928 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View PDF HTML (experimental) TeX Source view license Current browse context: hep-ph < prev | next > new | recent | 2026-04 Change to browse by: astro-ph astro-ph.CO References & Citations INSPIRE HEP SciX Google Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer ( What is the Explorer? ) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers ( What is Connected Papers? ) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps ( What is Litmaps? ) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations ( What are Smart Citations? ) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv ( What is alphaXiv? ) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers ( What is CatalyzeX? ) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub ( What is DagsHub? ) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub ( What is GotitPub? ) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face ( What is Huggingface? ) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast ( What is ScienceCast? ) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate ( What is Replicate? ) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces ( What is Spaces? ) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI ( What is TXYZ.AI? ) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower ( What are Influence Flowers? ) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender ( What is CORE? ) IArxiv recommender toggle IArxiv Recommender ( What is IArxiv? ) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs . Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax ( What is MathJax? ) We gratefully acknowledge support from our major funders , member institutions , and all contributors. About · Help · Contact · Subscribe · Copyright · Privacy · Accessibility · Operational Status (opens in new tab)

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