Related papers: Testing the Kerr hypothesis beyond the quadrupole …
We analyze in detail the spin precession equations in binary black hole systems, when the tidal torque on a Kerr black hole due to quadrupole-monopole coupling is taken into account. We show that completing the precession equations with…
Advanced LIGO's recent observations of gravitational waves (GWs) from merging binary black holes have opened up a unique laboratory to test general relativity (GR) in the highly relativistic regime. One of the tests used to establish the…
Gravitational waves exhibit the unique signature of their spin-2 nature in processes of wave scattering, due to the interaction between spin and a background spacetime. Since the spin effect is more pronounced for longer wavelengths and…
The LIGO/Virgo detections of binary black hole mergers marked a watershed moment in astronomy, ushering in the era of precision tests of Kerr dynamics. We review theoretical and experimental challenges that must be overcome to carry out…
Merging binary black holes exhibit a ringdown phase in which they primarily emit gravitational waves in the shape of damped sinusoids corresponding to quasi-normal modes of the Kerr remnant. In general, each mode carries four degrees of…
GW241011 and GW241110 both exhibit extremely asymmetric masses, high primary spins, and significant spin-orbit misalignment, which challenge the formation of first-generation binary black hole mergers formed from stellar collapse. This…
The binary black hole signal GW250114, the clearest gravitational wave detected to date, offers a unique opportunity to test general relativity in the relativistic strong-gravity regime. How well does GW250114 agree with Einstein's…
The gravitational-wave signal GW250114 was observed by the two LIGO detectors with a network matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 80. The signal was emitted by the coalescence of two black holes with near-equal masses $m_1 =…
We present the first modeled search for gravitational waves using the complete binary black hole gravitational waveform from inspiral through the merger and ringdown for binaries with negligible component spin. We searched approximately 2…
On September 14, 2015, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detected a gravitational-wave transient (GW150914); we characterize the properties of the source and its parameters. The data around the time of the event…
We present a detailed analysis of GW250114, the loudest gravitational-wave signal observed to date, using a waveform model capable of describing binary black holes in generic (eccentric and precessing) orbits. Our analysis builds on…
Gravitational waves from the explosive merger of distant black holes are encoded with details regarding the complex extreme-gravity spacetime present at their source. Famously described by the Kerr spacetime metric for rotating black holes…
Measurements of black-hole spins from gravitational-wave observations of black-hole binaries with ground-based detectors are expected to be hampered by partial degeneracies in the gravitational-wave phasing: between the two component spins,…
We describe recent numerical simulations of the merger of a class of equal mass, non-spinning, eccentric binary black hole systems in general relativity. We show that with appropriate fine-tuning of the initial conditions to a region of…
We characterize the expected statistical errors with which the parameters of black-hole binaries can be measured from gravitational-wave (GW) observations of their inspiral, merger and ringdown by a network of second-generation ground-based…
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…
The relativistic multipole moments provide a key ingredient to characterize the gravitational field around compact astrophysical objects. They play a crucial role in the description of the orbital evolution of coalescing binary systems and…
We propose a novel method to test the consistency of the multipole moments of compact binary systems with the predictions of General Relativity (GR). The multipole moments of a compact binary system, known in terms of symmetric and…
Estimates of the source parameters of gravitational-wave (GW) events produced by compact binary mergers rely on theoretical models for the GW signal. We present the first frequency-domain model for inspiral, merger and ringdown of the GW…
We analyze the event GW 150914 announced by the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) as the gravitational-wave emission of a black-hole binary merger. We show that the parameters of the coalescing system and…