Computing the merger of black-hole binaries: The IBBH problem

Physical Review D - Particles, Fields, Gravitation and Cosmology

Volumn 58, Issue 6, 1998, Pages

  Brady, P ^a   Creighton, J ^a   Thorne, K ^a  

^a CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0542418231     PISSN: 15507998     EISSN: 15502368     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.58.061501     Document Type: Article

References (23)

1. For (Formula presented) the volume of the Universe that LIGO and VIRGO can search scales approximately as (Formula presented) so (Formula presented) BBH’s can be seen through a volume 400 times larger than binary neutron stars. This is likely to more than make up for the lower formation rate of BBH’s, and it means that the first BBH’s seen are likely to be the rarer ones with (Formula presented) rather than the presumably more common ones with (Formula presented) See V. M. Lipunov, K. A. Postnov, and M. E. Prokhorov, New Astron. 2, 43 (1997); NEASFS
2. also É. É. Flanagan and S. A. Hughes, Phys. Rev. D 57, 4535 (1998).PRVDAQ
3. S. Sigurdsson and L. Hernquist, Nature (London) 364, 423 (1993) argue that one BBH forms in every core-collapse start cluster and that the resulting BBH merger rate may be as high as ∼1 per year in a sphere of radius 200 Mpc (the distance to which the first LIGO and VIRGO interferometers can see with signal to noise ratio 5.5 if (Formula presented) but the rate could be much lower. NATUAS
4. V. M. Lipunov, K. A. Postnov, and M. E. Prokhorov, New Astron. 2, 43 (1997) argue for a rate ranging up to this same value based on the evolution of populations of massive main-sequence binaries in galaxies like our own, but NEASFS
5. S. F. Portegies Zwart and L. R. Yungelson, Astron. Astrophys. 332, 173 (1998), in a similar type of analysis, obtain a vanishing rate of such BBH mergers. The enhanced LIGO interferometers are expected to see a volume 1000 times greater than the initial ones, and thus a 1000 times higher event rate; AAEJAFsee K. S. Thorne, in Critical Problems in Physics, edited by Val L. Fitch, Daniel R. Marlow, and Margit A. E. Dementi (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1997), p. 167.
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8. L. S. Finn and K. S. Thorne identified the IBBH Problem in spring 1996 and organized an August 1996 workshop at Caltech to brainstorm on its solution.
9. We take a 2% error in energy loss rate to signal PN failure because the remaining number of radians of inspiral waveform is Φ≳100, and an error of more than 2 radians will seriously affect the LIGO and VIRGO data analysis. Our values of (Formula presented) at PN failure are independent of the black-hole spins and are inferred from calculations in the limit η≡(reduced mass)/(total mass)≪1 [Figure 1 of T. Tanaka, H. Tagoshi, and M. Sasaki, Prog. Theor. Phys. 96, 1087 (1996); PTPKAV
10. Figure 1 of H. Tagoshi, M. Shibata, T. Tanaka, and M. Sasaki, Phys. Rev. D 54, 1439 (1996)], extrapolated to η=1/4 (equal masses). PRVDAQOur values of T, (Formula presented) and Φ are based on the Newtonian-quadrupole equations (Formula presented) and (Formula presented) with η=1/4, which are known to be accurate to within a few tens of percent at ν=0.3 and η≪1 [L. S. Finn and K. S. Thorne (in preparation)].
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