After the Avalanche: Astrophysical Lessons from the fourth GW observing run, February 22-26, 2027 in Sexten
After the Avalanche: Astrophysical Lessons from the fourth GW observing run, February 22-26, 2027 in Sexten
How binary black holes and neutron stars form and merge is the central question in gravitational-wave astrophysics. A decade after the first direct detection of a binary black hole merger, it remains unclear which gravitational-wave events probe the evolution of isolated massive binary stars, the dynamics of dense environments like star clusters, and active galactic nuclei, or more exotic pathways. One of the main hurdles has been the low-number statistics that prevented statistically robust identification of sub-populations within the observed population of gravitational-waves.