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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…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2022-04-26 Shanika Galaudage , Colm Talbot , Tushar Nagar , Deepnika Jain , Eric Thrane , Ilya Mandel

The population properties of intermediate mass black holes remain largely unknown, and understanding their distribution could provide a missing link in the formation of supermassive black holes and galaxies. Gravitational wave observations…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2022-06-22 Joseph Gais , Ken Ng , Eungwang Seo , Kaze W. K. Wong , Tjonnie G. F. Li

Gravitational-wave events are interpreted in terms of Bayesian posteriors for their source properties inferred under unphysical reference priors. Though these parameter estimates are important intermediate data products for downstream…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2026-04-20 Matthew Mould , Rodrigo Tenorio , Davide Gerosa

Massive black hole binary systems, with masses in the range ~10^4-10^10 \msun, are among the primary sources of gravitational waves in the frequency window ~10^-9 Hz - 0.1 Hz. Pulsar Timing Arrays (PTAs) and the Laser Interferometer Space…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-13 Alberto Sesana , Alberto Vecchio , Carlo Nicola Colacino

Binary black holes formed via different pathways are predicted to have distinct spin properties. Measuring these properties with gravitational waves provides an opportunity to unveil the origins of binary black holes. Recent work draws…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2024-03-27 Hui Tong , Shanika Galaudage , Eric Thrane

Characterizing the properties of black holes is one of the most important science objectives for gravitational-wave observations. Astrophysical evidence suggests that black holes that are nearly extremal (i.e. spins near the theoretical…

The formation of merging binary black holes can occur through multiple astrophysical channels such as, e.g., isolated binary evolution and dynamical formation or, alternatively, have a primordial origin. Increasingly large…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2022-04-13 Simone S. Bavera , Gabriele Franciolini , Giulia Cusin , Antonio Riotto , Michael Zevin , Tassos Fragos

The formation and growth processes of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are not well constrained. SMBH population models, however, provide specific predictions for the properties of the gravitational-wave background (GWB) from binary SMBHs…

We derive a Fisher matrix for the parameters characterising a population of gravitational-wave events. This provides a guide to the precision with which population parameters can be estimated with multiple observations, which becomes…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2022-12-14 Jonathan R. Gair , Andrea Antonelli , Riccardo Barbieri

Next-generation gravitational-wave observatories will reach farther into the universe than currently possible, revealing black-hole mergers from early stellar binary systems such as Population III stars, whose properties are currently…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2025-05-13 Cailin Plunkett , Matthew Mould , Salvatore Vitale

Gravitational waves deliver information in exquisite detail about astrophysical phenomena, among them the collision of two black holes, a system completely invisible to the eyes of electromagnetic telescopes. Models that predict…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2015-06-24 Deirdre Shoemaker , Karan Jani , Lionel London , Larne Pekowsky

Gravitational-wave observations have the potential of allowing the identification of a population of merging primordial black-hole binaries. We provide an overview of the capabilities of present and future GW detectors, with a special…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2024-08-01 Francesco Iacovelli , Michele Maggiore

Third generation gravitational-wave (GW) detectors are expected to detect a large number of binary black holes (BBHs) to large redshifts, opening up an independent probe of the large scale structure using their clustering. This probe will…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2023-11-14 Aditya Vijaykumar , M. V. S. Saketh , Sumit Kumar , Parameswaran Ajith , Tirthankar Roy Choudhury

Understanding the predictions of general relativity for the dynamical interactions of two black holes has been a long-standing unsolved problem in theoretical physics. Black-hole mergers are monumental astrophysical events, releasing…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2011-09-29 Joan M. Centrella , John G. Baker , Bernard J. Kelly , James R. van Meter

Binary black holes may form both through isolated binary evolution and through dynamical interactions in dense stellar environments. The formation channel leaves an imprint on the alignment between the black hole spins and the orbital…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2018-04-12 Simon Stevenson , Christopher P. L. Berry , Ilya Mandel

Strong evidence for an isotropic, Gaussian gravitational wave background (GWB) has been found by multiple pulsar timing arrays (PTAs). The GWB is expected to be sourced by a finite population of supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs)…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2026-05-21 William G. Lamb , Jeremy M. Wachter , Andrea Mitridate , Shashwat C. Sardesai , Bence Bécsy , Emily L. Hagen , Stephen R. Taylor , Luke Zoltan Kelley

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…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2019-03-27 Carlos O. Lousto , James Healy

The gravitational wave signal of binary compact objects has two main contributions at frequencies below the characteristic merger frequency: the gravitational wave signal associated with the early inspiral stage of the binary and the…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2025-10-09 Silvia Gasparotto , Gabriele Franciolini , Valerie Domcke

The observation of gravitational waves from multiple compact binary coalescences by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA detector networks has enabled us to infer the underlying distribution of compact binaries across a wide range of masses, spins, and…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2023-11-01 Anarya Ray , Ignacio Magaña Hernandez , Siddharth Mohite , Jolien Creighton , Shasvath Kapadia

With the recent release of the second gravitational-wave transient catalogue (GWTC-2), which introduced dozens of new detections, we are at a turning point of gravitational wave astronomy, as we are now able to directly infer constraints on…