Related papers: Puncture Initial Data for Black-Hole Binaries with…
We use post-Newtonian (PN) approximations to determine the initial orbital and spin parameters of black hole binaries that lead to low-eccentricity inspirals when evolved with numerical relativity techniques. In particular, we seek initial…
Astrophysical black holes could be nearly extremal (that is, rotating nearly as fast as possible); therefore, nearly extremal black holes could be among the binaries that current and future gravitational-wave observatories will detect.…
We integrate the third and a half post-Newtonian equations of motion for a fully generic binary black hole system, allowing both for non-circular orbits, and for one or both of the black holes to spin, in any orientation. Using the second…
We use the `moving puncture' approach to perform fully non-linear evolutions of spinning quasi-circular black-hole binaries with individual spins not aligned with the orbital angular momentum. We evolve configurations with the individual…
Binary black-hole systems with spins aligned with the orbital angular momentum are of special interest, as studies indicate that this configuration is preferred in nature. If the spins of the two bodies differ, there can be a prominent…
We describe a procedure for constructing initial data for boosted black holes in the moving-punctures approach to numerical relativity that endows the initial time slice from the outset with trumpet geometry within the black hole interiors.…
We present the first numerical simulations of an initially non-spinning black-hole binary with mass ratio as large as 10:1 in full general relativity. The binary completes approximately 3 orbits prior to merger and radiates about 0.415% of…
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…
We revisit the construction of puncture black hole initial data in the conformal thin-sandwich decomposition of Einstein's constraint equations. It has been shown previously that this approach cannot yield quasiequilibrium wormhole data,…
Initial data for numerical evolutions of binary-black holes have been dominated by "conformally flat" (CF) data (i.e., initial data where the conformal background metric is chosen to be flat) because they are easy to construct. However, CF…
We present the results of 61 new simulations of nonprecessing spinning black hole binaries with mass ratios $q=m_1/m_2$ in the range $1/3\leq q\leq1$ and individual spins covering the parameter space $-0.85\leq\alpha_{1,2}\leq0.85$. We…
We analyze the inspiral dynamics of equal-mass precessing black-hole binaries using multi-timescale techniques. The orbit-averaged post-Newtonian evolutionary equations admit two constants of motion in the equal-mass limit, namely the…
We investigate the (conservative) dynamics of binary black holes using the Hamiltonian formulation of the post-Newtonian (PN) equations of motion. The Hamiltonian we use includes spin-orbit coupling, spin-spin coupling, and mass…
We present a method to construct conformally curved initial data for charged black hole binaries with spin on arbitrary orbits. We generalize the superposed Kerr-Schild, extended conformal thin sandwich construction from [Lovelace et al.,…
We review current challenges in understanding the values and origin of the spins of black holes in binaries. Thanks to recent advances in astrophysical instrumentation, the spins can now be measured using both gravitational waves emitted by…
The construction of initial-data sets representing binary black-hole configurations in quasi-circular orbits is studied in the context of the conformal-imaging formalism. An effective-potential approach for locating quasi-circular orbits is…
(Abridged) By asymptotically matching a post-Newtonian (PN) metric to two tidally perturbed Schwarzschild metrics, we generate approximate initial data (in the form of a 4-metric) for a nonspinning black hole binary in a circular orbit. We…
We study the coalescence of non-spinning binary black holes from near the innermost stable circular orbit down to the final single rotating black hole. We use a technique that combines the full numerical approach to solve Einstein…
We study the momentum and Hamiltonian constraints of vacuum Einstein equations, within the Bowen-York formalism, for two interacting black holes in close separation, with anti-parallel spins and anti-parallel linear momenta. We give an…
We revisit the problem of predicting the spin magnitude and direction of the black hole resulting from the merger of two black holes with arbitrary masses and spins inspiralling in quasi-circular orbits. We do this by analyzing a catalog of…