Modeling Gravitational Recoil Using Numerical Relativity

TL;DR

This paper reviews advances in modeling gravitational recoil from black-hole mergers and introduces new simulations that validate an empirical recoil formula with high accuracy in specific regimes.

Contribution

It presents a new set of simulations testing and confirming the accuracy of an empirical recoil formula for generic black-hole binaries.

Findings

Recoil formula is accurate within a few km/s for similar mass-ratio binaries.

Simulations cover generic binaries with unequal masses and precessing spins.

Validation supports the empirical model's applicability in relevant astrophysical scenarios.

Abstract

We review the developments in modeling gravitational recoil from merging black-hole binaries and introduce a new set of 20 simulations to test our previously proposed empirical formula for the recoil. The configurations are chosen to represent generic binaries with unequal masses and precessing spins. Results of these simulations indicate that the recoil formula is accurate to within a few km/s in the similar mass-ratio regime for the out-of-plane recoil.