Spherical resonant-mass gravitational wave detectors

Abstract
A spherical gravitational wave antenna is a very promising detector for gravitational wave astronomy because it has a large cross section, isotropic sky coverage, and can provide the capability of determining the wave direction. In this paper we discuss several aspects of spherical detectors, including the eigenfunctions and eigenfrequencies of the normal modes of an elastic sphere, the energy cross section, and the response functions that are used to obtain the noise-free solution to the inverse problem. Using the maximum likelihood estimation method the inverse problem in the presence of noise is solved. We also determine the false-alarm probability and the detection probability for a network of spherical detectors and estimate the detectable event rates for supernova collapses and binary coalescences.