Related papers: A joint approach for reducing eccentricity and spu…
We develop a method to compute low-eccentricity initial data of black hole--neutron star binaries in the puncture framework extending previous work on other types of compact binaries. In addition to adjusting the orbital angular velocity of…
Given the absence of observations of black hole binaries, it is critical that the full range of accessible parameter space be explored in anticipation of future observation with gravitational wave detectors. To this end, we compile the…
Approximate solutions to the Einstein field equations are a valuable tool to investigate gravitational phenomena. An important aspect of any approximation is to investigate and quantify its regime of validity. We present a study that…
Accurate modelling of black hole binaries is critical to achieve the science goals of gravitational-wave detectors. Modelling such configurations relies strongly on calibration to numerical-relativity (NR) simulations. Binaries on…
We solve the Hamiltonian and momentum constraints of general relativity for two black holes with nearly extremal spins and relativistic boosts in the puncture formalism. We use a non-conformally-flat ansatz with an attenuated superposition…
We present the first comparison between numerical relativity (NR) simulations of an eccentric binary black hole system with corresponding post-Newtonian (PN) results. We evolve an equal-mass, non-spinning configuration with an initial…
In numerical evolutions of binary black holes (BBH) it is desirable to easily control the orbital eccentricity of the BBH, and the number of orbits completed by the binary through merger. This paper presents fitting formulae that allow to…
We describe and study an instantaneous definition of eccentricity to be applied at the initial moment of full numerical simulations of binary black holes. The method consists of evaluating the eccentricity at the moment of maximum…
Using a post-Newtonian diagnostic tool developed by Mora and Will, we examine numerically generated quasiequilibrium initial data sets that have been used in recently successful numerical evolutions of binary black holes through plunge,…
The starting point of any general relativistic numerical simulation is a solution of the Hamiltonian and momentum constraints that (ideally) represents an astrophysically realistic scenario. We present a new method to produce initial data…
Resolving the formation channel(s) of merging binary black holes is a key goal in gravitational-wave astronomy. The orbital eccentricity is believed to be a precious tracer of the underlying formation pathway, but is largely dissipated…
The late stage of the inspiral of two black holes may have important non-Newtonian effects that are unrelated to radiation reaction. To understand these effects we approximate a slowly inspiralling binary by a stationary solution to…
We discuss the initial value problem of general relativity in its recently unified Lagrangian and Hamiltonian pictures and present a multi-domain pseudo-spectral collocation method to solve the resulting coupled nonlinear partial…
Initial data for evolving black-hole binaries can be constructed via many techniques, and can represent a wide range of physical scenarios. However, because of the way that different schemes parameterize the physical aspects of a…
Black hole binaries on non-eccentric orbits form an important subclass of gravitational wave sources, but it is a non-trivial issue to construct numerical initial data with minimal initial eccentricity for numerical simulations. We compute…
Construction of binary black hole initial data is a prerequisite for numerical evolutions of binary black holes. This paper reports improvements to the binary black hole initial data solver in the Spectral Einstein Code, to allow robust…
Orbital eccentricity in compact binaries is considered to be a key tracer of their astrophysical origin, and can be inferred from gravitational-wave observations due to its imprint on the emitted signal. For a robust measurement, accurate…
We present improvements to construction of binary black hole initial data used in SpEC (the Spectral Einstein Code). We introduce new boundary conditions for the extended conformal thin sandwich elliptic equations that enforce the excision…
We study an accretion flow during the gravitational-wave driven evolution of binary massive black holes. After the binary orbit decays due to an interaction with a massive circumbinary disk, the binary is decoupled from the circumbinary…
With the goal of taking a step toward the construction of astrophysically realistic initial data for numerical simulations of black holes, we for the first time derive a family of fully general relativistic initial data based on…