Gravitational waves from inspiraling compact binaries: Accuracy of the post-Newtonian waveforms

TL;DR

This paper evaluates the accuracy of post-Newtonian gravitational waveforms for inspiraling compact binaries by comparing them with reference waveforms from black-hole perturbation theory using overlap integrals.

Contribution

It introduces a method to assess the accuracy of post-Newtonian waveforms, including Pade approximants, against more precise black-hole perturbation waveforms.

Findings

Post-Newtonian waveforms show varying accuracy depending on the approximation used.

Pade approximants improve the match with reference waveforms.

The study quantifies the validity range of different waveform models.

Abstract

The accuracy of the post-Newtonian waveforms, both in standard and Pade form, is determined by computing their matched-filtering overlap integral with a reference waveform obtained from black-hole perturbation theory.