Related papers: A "no-hair" test for binary black holes
Although General Relativity (GR) has been tested extensively in the weak gravity regime, similar tests in the strong gravity regime are still missing. In this paper we explore the possibility to use X-ray spectropolarimetric observations of…
General relativity has been tested by many experiments, which, however, almost exclusively probe weak spacetime curvatures. In this thesis, I create two frameworks for testing general relativity in the strong-field regime with observations…
Assuming that general relativity is the correct theory of gravity in the strong field limit, can gravitational wave observations distinguish between black hole and other compact object sources? Alternatively, can gravitational wave…
Black holes in General Relativity are famously characterized by two "hairs" only, the mass and the spin of the Kerr spacetime. Theories extending General Relativity, however, allow in principle for additional black hole charges, which will…
The evidence for supermassive Kerr black holes in galactic centers is strong and growing, but only the detection of gravitational waves will convincingly rule out other possibilities to explain the observations. The Kerr spacetime is…
In light of the current (and future) gravitational wave detections, more sensitive tests of general relativity can be devised. Black hole spectroscopy has long been proposed as a way to test the no-hair theorem, that is, how closely an…
General relativity has been widely tested in weak gravitational fields but still stands largely untested in the strong-field regime. According to the no-hair theorem, black holes in general relativity depend only on their masses and spins…
Gravitational wave astronomy has opened an unprecedented window onto tests of gravity and fundamental physics in the strong-field regime. In this study, we examine a series of well-motivated deviations from the classical Kerr solution of…
The spins of a number of supermassive and stellar-mass black holes have been measured based on detections of thermal continuum emission and relativistically broadened iron lines in their x-ray spectra. Likewise, quasiperiodic variability…
We propose a novel method to test the binary black hole (BBH) nature of compact binaries detectable by gravitational wave (GW) interferometers and hence constrain the parameter space of other exotic compact objects. The spirit of the test…
Scalar-tensor theories are a compelling alternative to general relativity and one of the most accepted extensions of Einstein's theory. Black holes in these theories have no hair, but could grow "wigs" supported by time-dependent boundary…
The theory of general relativity (GR) is the standard framework for the description of gravitation and the geometric structure of spacetime. With the recent advancement of observational instruments, it has become possible to probe the…
Observations of the precessing orbits of stars very near the massive black hole in the galactic center could provide measurements of the spin and quadrupole moment of the hole and thereby test the no-hair theorem of general relativity.…
When two black holes merge, the late stage of gravitational wave emission is a superposition of exponentially damped sinusoids. According to the black hole no-hair theorem, this ringdown spectrum depends only on the mass and angular…
The black hole in the center of the Milky Way, Sgr A*, has the largest mass-to-distance ratio among all known black holes in the Universe. This property makes Sgr A* the optimal target for testing the gravitational no-hair theorem. In the…
Black holes in General Relativity are very simple objects. This property, that goes under the name of "no-hair," has been refined in the last few decades and admits several versions. The simplicity of black holes makes them ideal testbeds…
The gravitational field around an astrophysical black hole (BH) is thought to be described by the Kerr spacetime, which is a solution of the Einstein equation. Signatures of binary black hole (BBH) coalescence in gravitational waves (GW)…
Gravitational waves provide direct information about the nature of spacetime and the existence of black holes. The remnant of a binary black hole merger emits gravitational waves in the form of quasinormal modes, whose spectrum is known as…
The multipole moments of black holes in general relativity obey certain consistency relations known as the no-hair theorems. The details of this multipolar structure are imprinted into the gravitational waves emitted by binary black holes,…
General relativity predicts that a black hole that results from the merger of two compact stars (either black holes or neutron stars) is initially highly deformed but soon settles down to a quiescent state by emitting a superposition of…