Related papers: Foundations of multiple black hole evolutions
We present new techniqes for evolving binary black hole systems which allow the accurate determination of gravitational waveforms directly from the wave zone region of the numerical simulations. Rather than excising the black hole…
Research on extracting science from binary-black-hole (BBH) simulations has often adopted a "scattering matrix" perspective: given the binary's initial parameters, what are the final hole's parameters and the emitted gravitational waveform?…
Binary black holes may form both through isolated binary evolution and through dynamical interactions in dense stellar environments. The formation channel leaves an imprint on the alignment between the black hole spins and the orbital…
We consider the dynamical evolution of bound, hierarchical triples of supermassive black holes that might be formed in the nuclei of galaxies undergoing sequential mergers. The tidal force of the outer black hole on the inner binary…
We explore the benefits of adapted gauges to small mass ratio binary black hole evolutions in the moving puncture formulation. We find expressions that approximate the late time behavior of the lapse and shift, $(\alpha_0,\beta_0)$, and use…
The study of unbound binary-black-hole encounters provides a gauge-invariant approach to exploring strong-field gravitational interactions in two-body systems, which can subsequently inform waveform models for bound orbits. In this work, we…
We consider the numerical evolution of black hole initial data sets, consisting of single black holes distorted by strong gravitational waves, with a full 3D, nonlinear evolution code. These data sets mimic the late stages of coalescing…
We present the first fully-nonlinear numerical study of the dynamics of highly spinning black-hole binaries. We evolve binaries from quasicircular orbits (as inferred from Post-Newtonian theory), and find that the last stages of the orbital…
We present a singularity excision algorithm appropriate for numerical simulations of black holes moving throughout the computational domain. The method is an extension of the excision procedure previously used to obtain stable simulations…
The close limit approximation of binary black hole is a powerful method to study gravitational-wave emission from highly non-linear geometries. In this work, we use it as a tool to model black hole spacetimes in theories of gravity with a…
We briefly discuss a method to construct a global, analytic, approximate spacetime for precessing, spinning binary black holes. The spacetime construction is broken into three parts: the inner zones are the spacetimes close to each black…
We report on results of fully consistent N-body simulations of globular cluster models with N = 100 000 members containing neutron stars and black holes. Using the improved `algorithmic regularization' method of Hellstrom and Mikkola for…
Simulations of binary black hole systems using the Spectral Einstein Code (SpEC) are done on a computational domain that excises the regions inside the black holes. It is imperative that the excision boundaries are outflow boundaries with…
We study the evolution of black hole collisions and ultraspinning black hole instabilities in higher dimensions. These processes can be efficiently solved numerically in an effective theory in the limit of large number of dimensions D. We…
The vast majority of massive binary systems in the universe is evidently unsuited to produce merging binary black holes. However, several narrow evolutionary paths of isolated massive binaries towards this goal have recently been…
We present direct N-body simulations of black-hole-only clusters with up to $2 \cdot 10^4$ compact objects, zero natal spin and no primordial binaries as predicted by various primordial black hole (PBH) Dark Matter models. The clusters'…
We explore how a recently developed analytical black-hole binary spacetime can be extended using numerical simulations to go beyond the slow-inspiral phase. The analytic spacetime solves the Einstein field equations approximately, with the…
The hierarchical nature of galaxy formation in the $\Lambda$CDM framework often leads to multiple supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in the galactic nuclei. The timescale over which galaxies merge, plays a crucial role in shaping the…
We analyze the excision strategy for simulating black holes. The problem is modeled by the propagation of quasi-linear waves in a 1-dimensional spatial region with timelike outer boundary, spacelike inner boundary and a horizon in between.…
In this paper, we explore the mechanisms that regulate the formation and evolution of stellar black hole binaries (BHBs) around supermassive black holes (SMBHs). We show that dynamical interactions can efficiently drive "in-situ" BHB…