Related papers: Where angular momentum goes in a precessing black …
Massive black holes appear to be present in the nuclei of almost all galaxies, but their genesis and evolution are not well understood. As astrophysical black holes are completely characterized by their masses and spins, the observed joint…
We derive an effective potential for binary black-hole (BBH) spin precession at second post-Newtonian order. This effective potential allows us to solve the orbit-averaged spin-precession equations analytically for arbitrary mass ratios and…
We report the first results from evolutions of a generic black-hole binary, i.e. a binary containing unequal mass black holes with misaligned spins. Our configuration, which has a mass ratio of 2:1, consists of an initially non-spinning…
The end state of a coalescing binary of compact objects depends strongly on the final total mass M and angular momentum J. Since gravitational radiation emission causes a slow evolution of the binary system through quasi-circular orbits…
We present new results on the angular momentum evolution of dark matter halos. Halos, from N-body simulations, are classified according to their mass growth histories into two categories: the accretion category contains halos whose mass has…
We study the spin dynamics of individual black holes in a binary system. In particular we focus on the polar precession of spins and the possibility of a complete flip of spins with respect to the orbital plane. We perform a full numerical…
We study the exact evolution of the orbital angular momentum of a massive particle in the gravitational field of a Kerr black hole. We show analytically that, for a wide class of orbits, the angular momentum's hodograph is always close to a…
The accretion flow in the disk dominated state of black hole binaries has peak temperature and luminosity which vary together in such a way as to indicate an approximately constant emitting area. The association of this with the last stable…
We present general relativistic magneto-hydrodynamical simulations of equal-mass spinning black hole binary mergers embedded in a magnetized gas cloud. We focus on the effect of the spin orientation relative to the orbital angular momentum…
Numerical-relativity simulations indicate that the black hole produced in a binary merger can recoil with a velocity up to v_max ~ 4,000 km/s with respect to the center of mass of the initial binary. This challenges the paradigm that most…
Two important parameters inferred from the gravitational wave signals of binaries of precessing black holes are the spin tilt angles, i.e., the angles at which the black holes' spin axes are inclined with respect to the binary's orbital…
Angular momentum and spin precession are expected to be generic features of a significant fraction of binary black hole systems. As such, it is essential to have waveform models that faithfully incorporate the effects of precession. Here,…
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…
During post-Newtonian evolution of a compact binary, a mass ratio different from 1 provides a second small parameter, which can lead to unexpected results. We present a statistics of supermassive black hole candidates, which enables us…
As a first step towards understanding the angular momentum evolution history of black holes in merging black-hole/neutron-star binaries, we perform population synthesis calculations to track the distribution of accretion histories of…
After eleven gravitational-wave detections from compact-binary mergers, we are yet to observe the striking general-relativistic phenomenon of orbital precession. Measurements of precession would provide valuable insights into the…
We study identical mass black hole binaries with spins perpendicular to the binary's orbital plane. These binaries have individual spins ranging from $s/m^2=-0.90$ to 0.90, ($s_1 = s_2$ in all cases) which is near the limit possible with…
We study the transition from inspiral to plunge in general relativity by computing gravitational waveforms of non-spinning, equal-mass black-hole binaries. We consider three sequences of simulations, starting with a quasi-circular inspiral…
As 2 black holes bound to each other in a close binary approach merger their inspiral time becomes shorter than the characteristic inflow time of surrounding orbiting matter. Using an innovative technique in which we represent the changing…
At the centre of a spherical and kinematically isotropic galaxy, the orientation of a massive binary black hole (BBH) orbit (i.e., the direction of the BBH orbital angular momentum) undergoes a random walk. If the stars in a spherical…