Related papers: Spin alignment and differential accretion in mergi…
We investigate whether a circumbinary gas disc can coalesce a supermassive black hole binary system in the centre of a galaxy. This is known to be problematic for a prograde disc. We show that in contrast, interaction with a retrograde…
Binary black holes on quasicircular orbits with spins aligned with their orbital angular momentum have been testbeds for analytic and numerical relativity for decades, not least because symmetry ensures that such configurations are…
We compute the gravitational waveform emitted during the transition from quasi-spherical inspiral to plunge, merger and ringdown for a system of two black holes in the extreme mass ratio limit, where the primary is spinning and the…
We perform magnetohydrodynamic simulations of accreting, equal-mass binary black holes in full general relativity focusing on the impact of black hole spin on the dynamical formation and evolution of minidisks. We find that during the late…
Gravitational waves emitted during the inspiral, plunge and merger of a black hole binary carry linear momentum. This results in an astrophysically important recoil to the final merged black hole, a ``kick'' that can eject it from the…
We present a study of spinning black hole binaries focusing on the spin dynamics of the individual black holes as well as on the gravitational recoil acquired by the black hole produced by the merger. We consider two series of initial spin…
Circumbinary accretion occurs throughout the universe, from the formation of stars and planets to the aftermath of major galactic mergers. We present an extensive investigation of circumbinary accretion disks, studying circular binaries…
Spectacular breakthroughs in numerical relativity now make it possible to compute spacetime dynamics in almost complete generality, allowing us to model the coalescence and merger of binary black holes with essentially no approximations.…
Using recent results from numerical relativity simulations of black hole mergers, we revisit previous studies of cosmological black hole spin evolution. We show that mergers are very unlikely to yield large spins, unless alignment of the…
Accreting supermassive black hole binaries are powerful multimessenger sources emitting both gravitational and EM radiation. Understanding the accretion dynamics of these systems and predicting their distinctive EM signals is crucial to…
We study the interplay between mass transfer, accretion and gravitational torques onto a black hole binary migrating in a self-gravitating, retrograde circumbinary disc. A direct comparison with an identical prograde disc shows that: (i)…
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…
Much of the parameter space relevant to the evolution of astrophysical circumbinary accretion discs remains unexplored. We have carried out a suite of circumbinary disc simulations surveying both disc thickness and kinematic viscosity,…
The inspiral of supermassive black-hole binaries in gas-rich environment is driven by the presence of an accretion disc and viscous interactions tend to align the spin of the black holes with the orbital angular momentum of the disc. Recent…
Modeling the late inspiral and merger of supermassive black holes is central to understanding accretion processes and the conditions under which electromagnetic emission accompanies gravitational waves. We use fully general relativistic,…
The dynamics of two massive black holes in a rotationally supported nuclear disc of 10^8 solar masses is explored using N-Body/SPH simulations. Gas and star particles are co-present in the disc. Described by a Mestel profile, the disc has a…
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 inspiral and merger of binary black holes will likely involve black holes with both unequal masses and arbitrary spins. The gravitational radiation emitted by these binaries will carry angular as well as linear momentum. A net flux of…
Spin precession occurs in binary black holes whose spins are misaligned with the orbital angular momentum. Otherwise, the spin configuration is constant and the subsequent binary dynamics and gravitational-wave emission are much simpler. We…
In this paper, we explore the gravitomagnetic interaction of a black hole (BH) with a misaligned accretion disc to study BH spin precession and alignment jointly with BH mass and spin parameter evolution, under the assumption that the disc…