GLADEnet: A progressive web app for multi-messenger cosmology and electromagnetic follow-ups of gravitational-wave sources

¹ Università degli Studi di Perugia, 06123 Perugia, Italy
e-mail: marialisa.brozzetti@studenti.unipg.it
² Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Sezione di Perugia, Via A. Pascoli, 1, 06123 Perugia, Italy
³ Universiteit Gent, 9000 Ghent, Belgium
⁴ Université de Strasbourg, CNRS, Observatoire astronomique de Strasbourg, UMR 7550, 67000 Strasbourg, France
⁵ INFN gruppo collegato di Parma, Parco Area delle Scienze 7/A, 43124 Parma, Italy
⁶ Università di Parma, Parco Area delle Scienze, Parco Area delle Scienze 7/A, 43124 Parma, Italy
⁷ Astronomy Research Center, Research Institute of Basic Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, South Korea
⁸ Gran Sasso Science Institute (GSSI), 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
⁹ Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, 67100 Assergi, Italy

Received: 26 September 2023
Accepted: 9 January 2024

Abstract

Multi-messenger astronomy is an emerging field of research aimed at unravelling the physics governing astrophysical transients. GW170817 stands out as the first multi-messenger observation of the coalescence of a binary system of neutron stars, detected by the LIGO and Virgo gravitational-wave interferometers, along with space- and ground-based electromagnetic telescopes. It is a striking example of how multi-messenger observations significantly enhance our understanding of the physics of compact objects, relativistic outflows, and nucleosynthesis. It shows a new way of making cosmology and has the potential to resolve the tension between different measurements of the expansion rate of the Universe. To optimise multi-messenger observational strategies, to evaluate the efficiency of the searches for counterparts, and to identify the host galaxy of the source in a large sky localisation, information about the volumes of galaxies within the gravitational-wave localisation is of paramount importance. This requires the use of galaxy catalogues and appropriate knowledge of their completeness. Here, we describe a new interactive web tool named GLADEnet that allows us to identify catalogued galaxies and to assess the incompleteness of the catalogue of galaxies in real time across the gravitational-wave sky localisation. This measure is of particular importance when using catalogues such as the GLADE catalogue (Galaxy List for the Advanced Detector Era), which includes a collection of various catalogues that make completeness differ across different regions of the sky. We discuss the analysis steps to defining a completeness coefficient and provide a comprehensive guide on how to use the web app, detailing its functionalities. The app is geared towards managing the vast collection of over 22 million objects in GLADE. The completeness coefficient and the GLADE galaxy list will be disseminated in real time via GLADEnet, powered by the Virtual Observatory (VO) standard and tools.