Detection of continuous gravitational wave signals: Pattern tracking with the Hough transform

Searching for patterns originating from continuous signals in time-frequency diagrams-such diagrams are produced by the very first states of a hierarchical procedure which are described in [2]—is the issue that we shall address in this presentation. We shall outline the main features of a strategy based on the use of the Hough transform by presenting the concept with an easy example and then illustrating the way we will apply it to the specific continuous gravitational wave signal search.