New Horizons for Psi: Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals in Fundamental Fields

TL;DR

This paper introduces modeling techniques for extreme-mass-ratio inspirals within environments of ultralight scalar fields, focusing on black hole perturbation theory and providing computational tools for analysis.

Contribution

It presents a framework for analyzing asymmetric mass-ratio binaries in scalar field environments using black hole perturbation theory, including a Mathematica implementation.

Findings

Modeling of binaries in scalar fields using perturbation theory

Derivation of equations of motion for spherically symmetric scalar clouds

Provision of computational tools for further research

Abstract

This set of notes guided a 2 hour lecture on "Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals in Fundamental Fields for the New Horizons for Psi School and Workshop", hosted at Instituto Superior Tecnico, University of Lisbon, between 1 - 5 July 2024. It introduces how to model asymmetric mass-ratio binaries evolving while immersed in an environment constituted by an ultralight (complex) scalar field using techniques of black hole perturbation theory, and focusing on the simpler example of a spherically symmetric cloud around a non-rotating black hole. A Mathematica notebook with the derivation and solver of the equations of motion of the system is also provided.