Related papers: When will we observe binary black holes precessing…
The spin-orbit tilt angles $\theta_{1(2)}$ of merging stellar-mass black holes provide key insights into their astrophysical origin. Non-parametric population modelling of The LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA Collaborations (2025a, arXiv:2508.18083)…
Recent work paints a conflicting portrait of the distribution of black hole spins in merging binaries measured with gravitational waves. Some analyses find that a significant fraction of merging binaries contain at least one black hole with…
A gravitational wave (GW) signal carries imprints of the properties of its source. The ability to extract source properties crucially depends on our prior knowledge of the signal morphology. Even though binary black hole (BBH) mergers are…
We explore spinning, precessing, unequal mass binary black holes to display the long term orbital angular momentum, $\vec{L}$, flip dynamics. We study two prototypical cases of binaries with mass ratios $q=1/7$ and $q=1/15$ and a misaligned…
We present PhenomPNR, a frequency-domain phenomenological model of the gravitational-wave (GW) signal from binary-black-hole mergers that is tuned to numerical relativity (NR) simulations of precessing binaries. In many current waveform…
We study the influence of astrophysical formation scenarios on the precessional dynamics of spinning black-hole binaries by the time they enter the observational window of second- and third-generation gravitational-wave detectors, such as…
Gravitational-wave observations are playing an instrumental role in understanding the population of binary compact objects in the Universe. These observations have begun to hint at the mass distribution of binary black holes (BBHs), with…
Spin precession is one of the key physical effects that could unveil the origin of the compact binaries detected by ground- and space-based gravitational-wave (GW) detectors, and shed light on their possible formation channels. Efficiently…
The evolution of the spin and tilt of black holes in compact black hole - neutron star and black hole - black hole binary systems is investigated within the framework of the coalescing compact star binary model for short gamma ray bursts…
We present a study of the gravitational waveforms from a series of spinning, equal-mass black hole binaries focusing on the harmonic content of the waves and the contribution of the individual harmonics to the signal-to-noise ratio. The…
When galaxies collide, dynamical friction drives their central supermassive black holes close enought to each other such that gravitational radiation becomes the leading dissipative effect. Gravitational radiation takes away energy,…
Measurements of the binary black hole spin distribution from the growing catalog of gravitational-wave observations can help elucidate the astrophysical processes shaping the formation and evolution of these systems. Spin-orbit resonances…
Recent detections of gravitational waves from merging binary black holes opened new possibilities to study the evolution of massive stars and black hole formation. In particular, stellar evolution models may be constrained on the basis of…
Population studies of stellar-mass black-hole binaries have become major players in gravitational-wave astronomy. The underlying assumptions are that the targeted source parameters refer to the same quantities for all events in the catalog…
Current searches for gravitational waves from compact-object binaries with the LIGO and Virgo observatories employ waveform models with spins aligned (or anti-aligned) with the orbital angular momentum. Here, we derive a new statistic to…
One of the goals of gravitational-wave astronomy is to quantify the evolution of the compact binary merger rate with redshift. The redshift distribution of black hole mergers would offer considerable information about their evolutionary…
Attempts to understand the formation of binary black hole (BBH) systems detected via gravitational wave (GW) emission are affected by many unknowns and uncertainties, from both the observational and theoretical (astrophysical modelling)…
In a regime where data are only mildly informative, prior choices can play a significant role in Bayesian statistical inference, potentially affecting the inferred physics. We show this is indeed the case for some of the parameters inferred…
We perform a set of 38 numerical simulations of equal-mass BH binaries in a configuration where the BH spins in the binary are equal in both magnitude and direction, to study precession effects. We vary the initial direction of the total…
Parameter estimation of binary-black-hole merger events in gravitational-wave data relies on matched-filtering techniques, which, in turn, depend on accurate model waveforms. Here we characterize the systematic biases introduced in…