GW$\times$LSS: Chasing the Progenitors of Merging Binary Black Holes
  Are the stellar-mass merging binary black holes, recently detected by their
gravitational wave signal, of stellar or primordial origin? Answering this
question will have profound implications for our understanding of the Universe,
including the nature of dark matter, the early Universe and stellar evolution.
We build on the idea that the clustering properties of merging binary black
holes can provide information about binary formation mechanisms and origin. The
cross-correlation of galaxy with gravitational wave catalogues carries
information about whether black hole mergers trace more closely the
distribution of dark matter -- indicative of primordial origin -- or that of
stars harboured in luminous and massive galaxies -- indicative of a stellar
origin. We forecast the detectability of such signal for several forthcoming
and future gravitational wave interferometers and galaxy surveys, including,
for the first time in such analyses, an accurate modelling for the different
merger rates, lensing magnification and other general relativistic effects. Our
results show that forthcoming experiments could allow us to test most of the
parameter space of the still viable models investigated, and shed more light on
the issue of binary black hole origin and evolution.
