Related papers: Dynamical shift condition for unequal mass black h…
Moving puncture simulations of black hole binaries rely on a specific gauge choice that leads to approximately stationary coordinates near each black hole. Part of the shift condition is a damping parameter, which has to be properly chosen…
Suitable gauge conditions are fundamental for stable and accurate numerical-relativity simulations of inspiralling compact binaries. A number of well-studied conditions have been developed over the last decade for both the lapse and the…
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…
We present a new approach to studying the evolution of massive black hole binaries in a stellar environment. By imposing conservation of total energy and angular momentum in scattering experiments, we find the dissipation forces that are…
A black hole binary approaching merger undergoes changes in its inspiral rate as energy and angular momentum are lost from the orbits into the horizons. This effect strengthens as the black holes come closer. We use numerical relativity…
We analyze the dynamical evolution of binary stars that interact with a static background of single stars in the environment of a massive black hole (MBH). All stars are considered to be single mass, Newtonian point particles. We follow the…
We present the results of 14 simulations of nonspinning black hole binaries with mass ratios $q=m_1/m_2$ in the range $1/100\leq q\leq1$. For each of these simulations we perform three runs at increasing resolution to assess the finite…
We give a unified description of the flip-flop effect in spinning binary black holes and the anti-alignment instability in terms of real and imaginary flip-flop frequencies. We find that this instability is only effective for mass ratios…
We perform the first fully nonlinear numerical simulations of black-hole binaries with mass ratios 100:1. Our technique for evolving such extreme mass ratios is based on the moving puncture approach with a new gauge condition and an optimal…
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…
This paper presents techniques and results for simulations of unequal mass, non-spinning black hole binaries with pseudo-spectral methods. Specifically, we develop an efficient root-finding procedure to ensure the black hole initial data…
We calculate the evolution and gravitational-wave emission of a spinning compact object inspiraling into a substantially more massive (non-rotating) black hole. We extend our previous model for a non-spinning binary [Phys. Rev. D 93,…
The characteristics of black-hole X-ray binaries can be used to obtain information about their evolutionary history and the process of black-hole formation. In this paper I focus on systems with donor masses lower than the inferred…
The interaction of binary black hole mergers with their environments can be studied using numerical relativity simulations. These start only a short finite time before merger, at which point appropriate initial conditions must be imposed. A…
We introduce a gravitational waveform inversion strategy that discovers mechanical models of binary black hole (BBH) systems. We show that only a single time series of (possibly noisy) waveform data is necessary to construct the equations…
The standard approach to the numerical evolution of black hole data using the ADM formulation with maximal slicing and vanishing shift is extended to non-symmetric black hole data containing black holes with linear momentum and spin by…
The stellar ejection rate and the rates of change of the binary semimajor axis and eccentricity are derived from scattering experiments for the restricted three-body problem. They are used to study the evolution of binaries in simple models…
Using the 3D smoothed particle hydrodynamics code PHANTOM, we investigate the evolution of the orbital properties of massive black hole binaries embedded in massive discs where gravitational instabilities (GIs) triggered by the disc…
Based on the consideration of potential energy of the di-black-hole as a function of mass asymmetry (transfer) collective coordinate, the possibility of matter transfer between the black holes in a binary system is investigated. The…
We calculate the formation rates of low-mass X-ray binaries with a black hole. Both a semi-analytic and a more detailed model predict formation rates two orders of magnitude lower than derived from the observations. Solution of this…