Anisotropic Searches for Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds and Foregrounds with the Bayesian LISA Pipeline (BLIP)

LISA data is expected to feature at least one significant anisotropic stochastic gravitational wave (GW) signal: a galactic foreground comprised of the GW contribution from millions of unresolved double white dwarf (DWD) binaries throughout our galaxy. We use the Bayesian LISA Pipeline (BLIP) to simulate a realistic, population-derived stochastic signal from unresolved DWDs in the Milky Way, and apply BLIP’s all-sky spherical harmonic analysis to perform an anisotropic search for the resulting foreground. We present the results of this search alongside new insight into the angular resolution of the spherical harmonic search, and discuss directions of further development in the area of anisotropic stochastic searches and characterization of the galactic foreground with LISA.