Not a bad question at all really. In principle, gravitational waves could exist at any frequency.
The speed, wavelength, and frequency of a gravitational wave are related by the equation c = λf, just like the equation for a light wave.
For example, the animations shown here oscillate roughly once every two seconds. This would correspond to a frequency of 0.5 Hz, and a wavelength of about 600 000 km, or 47 times the diameter of the Earth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_waveTo get a short wavelength requires a high frequency, to get an observable gravity wave requires a very large mass. We haven't yet seen a Super Massive Black Hole orbiting with (say) an Mercury orbit radius at a thousand times a second. There is another quote from that wikipedia article: Stephen Hawking and Werner Israel list different frequency bands for gravitational waves that could plausibly be detected, ranging from 10^−7 Hz (very slow) up to 10^11 Hz (very very fast).
The faster the wave the shorter the wavelength and the greater the difficulty in detection (as the amplitude likely lessens and with distance falls below our current direct means).You'd have to chase the Hawking-Israel paper for their thoughts on short wavelength high frequency gravitational wave sources and how they believe they might plausibly be detected .. I anticipate some devil in the detail. http://library.lol/main/F92F35CD83F13A6021FC2385BBA171B0 ( perhaps wikipedia misquoted that high frequency ) |
> To get a short wavelength requires a high frequency
For light that is assuming a vacuum. The more general equation is c' = λf where c' is the speed of light in the medium the light is traveling through. c' <= c. Hence, for light, you can get a shorter wavelength without having to raise the frequency if you work with the light in a medium with a lower c'.
Is there anything similar with gravitational waves?