Conservative Dynamics of Binary Systems at Fourth Post-Minkowskian Order in the Large-eccentricity Expansion

TL;DR

This paper calculates the conservative dynamics of non-spinning binary systems at the fourth Post-Minkowskian order in the large-eccentricity limit, incorporating tail effects and providing results consistent with existing Post-Newtonian theories.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach using worldline effective field theory and analytic continuation to derive the bound radial action at this high order, including tail effects.

Findings

Agreement with state-of-the-art Post-Newtonian results

All orders in velocities obtained through differential equations

Captures local-in-time effects and logarithmic corrections

Abstract

We compute the conservative dynamics of non-spinning binaries at fourth Post-Minkowskian order in the large-eccentricity limit, including both potential and radiation-reaction tail effects. This is achieved by obtaining the scattering angle in the worldline effective field theory approach and deriving the bound radial action via analytic continuation. The associated integrals are bootstrapped to all orders in velocities through differential equations, with boundary conditions in the potential and radiation regions. The large angular momentum expansion captures all the local-in-time effects as well as the trademark logarithmic corrections for generic bound orbits. Agreement is found in the overlap with the state-of-the-art in Post-Newtonian theory.