In the next decade, the LISA gravitational-wave observatory will begin observations in the low-frequency part of the gravitational wave spectrum, increasing the number of known sources in the gravitational-wave catalog by several orders of magnitude. Among those sources will be thousands of multi-messenger systems that astronomers can mine for information about the Universe. In this talk, we will examine the ultra-compact binary population of the Milky Way, and discuss the power of combining both gravitational wave and electromagnetic observations. We'll give several vignettes of how the two observational mediums may be used in concert to probe a variety of different astrophysical phenomena in the stellar graveyard.

Bio: Shane Larson was a research professor of physics at Northwestern Univ, where he was the Associate Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics. He is joining the Physics Department at Clarkson University in Summer 2025, where he will be the Director of Integrated Engineering and Applied Science Projects. He works in the field of gravitational wave astrophysics, specializing in studies of compact stars, binaries, and the galaxy with both the ground-based LIGO project, and the forthcoming space-based observatory LISA. He is currently a member of the board of the LISA Consortium, and is the co-chair of the LISA Astrophysics Working Group. He grew up in Eastern Oregon. He received his BS in physics from Oregon State, and his MS and PhD from Montana State. His postdoctoral work was at JPL, Caltech, and at the Physics Frontier Center at Penn State. He is an award-winning teacher, and a Fellow of the American Physical Society. He contributes regularly to a public science blog at writescience.wordpress.com, and posts at Bluesky with the handle @sciencejedi .