Discovering intermediate-mass black hole lenses through gravitational
  wave lensing
  Intermediate-mass black holes are the missing link that connects stellar-mass
to supermassive black holes and are key to understanding galaxy evolution.
Gravitational waves, like photons, can be lensed, leading to discernable
effects such as diffraction or repeated signals. We investigate the
detectability of intermediate-mass black hole deflectors in the LIGO-Virgo
detector network. In particular, we simulate gravitational waves with variable
source distributions lensed by an astrophysical population of intermediate-mass
black holes, and use standard LIGO tools to infer the properties of these
lenses. We find detections of intermediate-mass black holes at $98\%$
confidence level over a wide range of binary and lens parameters. Therefore, we
conclude that intermediate-mass black holes could be detected through lensing
of gravitational waves in the LIGO-Virgo detector network.
