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Highly accurate simulations of asymmetric black-hole scattering and cross validation of effective-one-body models

Oliver Long1,*, Harald P. Pfeiffer1, Alessandra Buonanno1,2, Gustav Uhre Jakobsen1,3, Gustav Mogull1,3,4, Antoni Ramos-Buades5, Hannes R. Rüter6, Lawrence E. Kidder7, and Mark A. Scheel8

  • *Contact author: oliver.long@aei.mpg.de
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Phys. Rev. D 112, 124039 – Published 9 December, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/p6fx-7798

Abstract

The study of unbound binary–black-hole encounters provides a gauge-invariant approach to exploring strong-field gravitational interactions in two-body systems, which can subsequently inform waveform models for bound orbits. In this work, we present 60 new highly accurate numerical relativity (NR) simulations of black-hole scattering, generated using the Spectral Einstein Code. Our simulations include 14 spin-aligned configurations, as well as 16 configurations with unequal masses, up to a mass ratio of 10. We perform the first direct comparison of scattering angles computed using different NR codes, finding good agreement. We compare our NR scattering angle results to the post-Minkowskian-based effective-one-body (EOB) closed-form models SEOB-PM and wEOB, finding less than 5% deviation except near the scatter-capture separatrix. Comparisons with the post-Newtonian-based EOB evolution models SEOBNRv5 and TEOBResumS-Dalí reveal that the former agrees within 8% accuracy with nonspinning NR results across most parameter ranges, whereas the latter matches similarly at lower energies but diverges significantly at higher energies. Both evolution EOB models exhibit increased deviations for spinning systems, predicting a notably different location of the capture separatrix compared to NR. Our key result is the first measurement of disparate scattering angles from NR simulations due to asymmetric gravitational-wave emission. We compare these results to SEOB-PM models constructed to calculate the scattering angle of a single black hole in asymmetric systems.

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Phys. Rev. D 112, 124039– Published 9 December, 2025
  • Received 18 July 2025
  • Accepted 24 October 2025
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