News from Horizons in Binary Black Hole Mergers

Vaishak Prasad, Anshu Gupta, Sukanta Bose, Badri Krishnan, and Erik Schnetter
Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 121101 – Published 16 September 2020

Abstract

In a binary black hole merger, it is known that the inspiral portion of the waveform corresponds to two distinct horizons orbiting each other and that the merger and ringdown signals correspond to the final horizon being formed and settling down to equilibrium. However, we still lack a detailed understanding of the relation between the horizon geometry in these three regimes and the observed waveform. Here we show that the well-known inspiral chirp waveform has a clear counterpart on black hole horizons, namely, the shear of the outgoing null rays at the horizon. We demonstrate that the shear behaves very much like a compact binary coalescence waveform with increasing frequency and amplitude. Furthermore, the parameters of the system estimated from the horizon agree with those estimated from the waveform. This implies that even though black hole horizons are causally disconnected from us, assuming general relativity to be true, we can potentially infer some of their detailed properties from gravitational wave observations.

  • Figure
  • Received 1 April 2020
  • Revised 3 July 2020
  • Accepted 26 August 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.125.121101

© 2020 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Gravitation, Cosmology & Astrophysics

Authors & Affiliations

Vaishak Prasad1, Anshu Gupta1, Sukanta Bose1,2, Badri Krishnan3,4, and Erik Schnetter5,6,7

  • 1Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Post Bag 4, Ganeshkhind, Pune 411 007, India
  • 2Department of Physics and Astronomy, Washington State University, 1245 Webster, Pullman, Washington 99164-2814, USA
  • 3Max-Planck-Institut für Gravitationsphysik (Albert Einstein Institute), Callinstrasse 38, 30167 Hanover, Germany
  • 4Leibniz Universität Hannover, Welfengarten 1-A, D-30167 Hanover, Germany
  • 5Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 2Y5, Canada
  • 6Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3G1, Canada
  • 7Center for Computation and Technology, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70803, USA

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Issue

Vol. 125, Iss. 12 — 18 September 2020

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