Colliding Black Holes: The Close Limit

TL;DR

This paper investigates the gravitational waves produced by two close black holes merging, using perturbation theory to extend previous numerical results and improve understanding of such events.

Contribution

It introduces a perturbative approach to analyze close black hole mergers, extending prior numerical findings with analytical methods.

Findings

Gravitational radiation computed matches full numerical results.

Perturbation theory effectively models close black hole mergers.

Results provide insights into gravitational wave signals from black hole collisions.

Abstract

The problem of the mutual attraction and joining of two black holes is of importance as both a source of gravitational waves and as a testbed of numerical relativity. If the holes start out close enough that they are initially surrounded by a common horizon, the problem can be viewed as a perturbation of a single black hole. We take initial data due to Misner for close black holes, apply perturbation theory and evolve the data with the Zerilli equation. The computed gravitational radiation agrees with and extends the results of full numerical computations.