Measuring orbital eccentricity and periastron advance in quasicircular black hole simulations

Abdul H. Mroué, Harald P. Pfeiffer, Lawrence E. Kidder, and Saul A. Teukolsky
Phys. Rev. D 82, 124016 – Published 8 December 2010

Abstract

We compare different methods of computing the orbital eccentricity of quasicircular binary black-hole systems using the orbital variables and gravitational-wave phase and frequency. For eccentricities of about a per cent, most methods work satisfactorily. For small eccentricity, however, the gravitational-wave phase allows a particularly clean and reliable measurement of the eccentricity. Furthermore, we measure the decay of the orbital eccentricity during the inspiral and find reasonable agreement with post-Newtonian results. Finally, we measure the periastron advance of nonspinning binary black holes, and we compare them to post-Newtonian approximations. With the low uncertainty in the measurement of the periastron advance, we positively detect deviations between fully numerical simulations and post-Newtonian calculations.

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  • Received 1 May 2010

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.82.124016

© 2010 The American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Abdul H. Mroué1,2, Harald P. Pfeiffer3,2, Lawrence E. Kidder1, and Saul A. Teukolsky1,3

  • 1Center for Radiophysics and Space Research, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 14853
  • 2Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, 60 St. George Street, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3H8, Canada
  • 3Theoretical Astrophysics 350-17, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125, USA

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Issue

Vol. 82, Iss. 12 — 15 December 2010

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