Report on the first round of the Mock LISA Data Challenges

Arnaud, K. A. and Auger, G. and Babak, S. and Baker, J. G. and Benacquista, M. J. and Bloomer, E. and Brown, D. A. and Camp, J. B. and Cannizzo, J. K. and Christensen, N. and Clark, J. and Cornish, N. J. and Crowder, J. and Cutler, C. and Finn, L. S. and Halloin, H. and Hayama, K. and Hendry, M. and Jeannin, O. and Królak, A. and Larson, S. L. and Mandel, I. and Messenger, C. and Meyer, R. and Mohanty, S. and Nayak, R. and Numata, K. and Petiteau, A. and Pitkin, M. and Plagnol, E. and Porter, E. K. and Prix, R. and Roever, C. and Stroeer, A. and Thirumalainambi, R. and Thompson, D. E. and Toher, J. and Umstaetter, R. and Vallisneri, M. and Vecchio, A. and Veitch, J. and Vinet, J. -Y. and Whelan, J. T. and Woan, G. (2007) Report on the first round of the Mock LISA Data Challenges. Classical and Quantum Gravity, 24 (19). S529-S539. ISSN 0264-9381

Abstract

The Mock LISA Data Challenges (MLDCs) have the dual purpose of fostering the development of LISA data analysis tools and capabilities, and demonstrating the technical readiness already achieved by the gravitational-wave community in distilling a rich science payoff from the LISA data output. The first round of MLDCs has just been completed: nine challenges consisting of data sets containing simulated gravitational-wave signals produced either by galactic binaries or massive black hole binaries embedded in simulated LISA instrumental noise were released in June 2006 with deadline for submission of results at the beginning of December 2006. Ten groups have participated in this first round of challenges. All of the challenges had at least one entry which successfully characterized the signal to better than 95% when assessed via a correlation with phasing ambiguities accounted for. Here, we describe the challenges, summarize the results and provide a first critical assessment of the entries.