Using gravitational-wave data to constrain dynamical tides in neutron star binaries

We discuss the role of dynamical tidal effects for inspiraling neutron star binaries, focusing on features that may be considered “unmodeled” in gravitational-wave searches. In order to cover the range of possibilities, we consider (i) individual oscillation modes becoming resonant with the tide, (ii) the elliptical instability, where a pair of inertial modes exhibit a nonlinear resonance with the tide, and (iii) the nonresonant p-g instability which may arise as high-order pressure (p) and gravity (g) modes in the star couple nonlinearly to the tide. In each case, we estimate the amount of additional energy loss that needs to be associated with the dynamical tide in order for the effect to impact on an observed gravitational-wave signal. We explore to what extent the involved neutron star physics may be considered known and how one may be able to use observational data to constrain theory.