2012/05/31 by George Reifenberger, Wolfgang Tichy · 20 citations
Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Astrophysics #Binary black hole #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Black hole (networking) #Classical mechanics #Computer science #Gauge (firearms) #Gravitation #Gravitational wave #Mathematics #Numerical relativity #Physics #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #Schwarzschild radius #Spurious relationship #Statistics #Theoretical physics #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.86.064003
published in Physical review. D. Particles, fields, gravitation, and cosmology/Physical review. D. Particles and fields 86(6) (American Physical Society) · 11 pages, 11 figures, 1 appendix, typos corrected, removed duplicate reference, matches published version
openalex publication_date 2012/09/05 · arxiv created 2012/10/24 · arxiv updated 2015/03/19 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Standard puncture initial data have been widely used for numerical binary black hole evolutions despite their shortcomings, most notably the inherent lack of gravitational radiation at the initial time that is later followed by a burst of spurious radiation. We study the evolution of three alternative initial data schemes. Two of the three alternatives are based on post-Newtonian expansions that contain realistic gravitational waves. The first scheme is based on a second-order post-Newtonian expansion in Arnowitt, Deser, and Misner transverse-traceless (ADMTT) gauge that has been resummed to approach standard puncture data at the black holes. The second scheme is based on asymptotic matching of the 4-metrics of two tidally perturbed Schwarzschild solutions to a first-order post-Newtonian expansion in ADMTT gauge away from the black holes. The final alternative is obtained through asymptotic matching of the 4-metrics of two tidally perturbed Schwarzschild solutions to a second-order post-Newtonian expansion in harmonic gauge away from the black holes. When evolved, the second scheme fails to produce quasicircular orbits (and instead leads to a nearly head-on collision). This failure can be traced back to inaccuracies in the extrinsic curvature due to low-order matching. More encouraging is that the latter two alternatives lead to quasicircular orbits and show gravitational radiation from the onset of the evolution, as well as a reduction of spurious radiation. Current deficiencies compared to standard punctures data include more eccentric trajectories during the inspiral and larger constraint violations, since the alternative data sets are only approximate solutions of Einstein's equations. The eccentricity problem can be ameliorated by adjusting the initial momentum parameters.