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Nonlinearities in Black Hole Ringdowns

Keefe Mitman1,*, Macarena Lagos2,†, Leo C. Stein3,‡, Sizheng Ma1, Lam Hui2, Yanbei Chen1, Nils Deppe1, François Hébert1, Lawrence E. Kidder4 et al.

Jordan Moxon1, Mark A. Scheel1, Saul A. Teukolsky1,4, William Throwe4, and Nils L. Vu5

  • 1Theoretical Astrophysics 350-17, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125, USA
  • 2Department of Physics and Astronomy, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA
  • 3Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Mississippi, University, Mississippi 38677, USA
  • 4Cornell Center for Astrophysics and Planetary Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA
  • 5Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute), Am Mühlenberg 1, D-14476 Potsdam, Germany

  • *kmitman@caltech.edu
  • †m.lagos@columbia.edu
  • ‡lcstein@olemiss.edu
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Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 081402 – Published 22 February, 2023

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.130.081402

Abstract

The gravitational wave strain emitted by a perturbed black hole (BH) ringing down is typically modeled analytically using first-order BH perturbation theory. In this Letter, we show that second-order effects are necessary for modeling ringdowns from BH merger simulations. Focusing on the strain’s (ℓ,m)=(4,4) angular harmonic, we show the presence of a quadratic effect across a range of binary BH mass ratios that agrees with theoretical expectations. We find that the quadratic (4,4) mode’s amplitude exhibits quadratic scaling with the fundamental (2,2) mode—its parent mode. The nonlinear mode’s amplitude is comparable to or even larger than that of the linear (4,4) mode. Therefore, correctly modeling the ringdown of higher harmonics—improving mode mismatches by up to 2 orders of magnitude—requires the inclusion of nonlinear effects.

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Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Viewpoint

Finding Nonlinearities in Black Hole Ringdowns

Published 22 February, 2023

Simulations show that nonlinear spacetime dynamics manifest in the postmerger gravitational-wave signal of binary black hole coalescence.

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See Also

Nonlinear Effects in Black Hole Ringdown

Mark Ho-Yeuk Cheung, Vishal Baibhav, Emanuele Berti, Vitor Cardoso, Gregorio Carullo, Roberto Cotesta, Walter Del Pozzo, Francisco Duque, Thomas Helfer, Estuti Shukla, and Kaze W. K. Wong
Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 081401 (2023)

Generation and propagation of nonlinear quasinormal modes of a Schwarzschild black hole

Macarena Lagos and Lam Hui
Phys. Rev. D 107, 044040 (2023)

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Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 081402– Published 22 February, 2023
  • Received 26 August 2022
  • Revised 8 November 2022
  • Accepted 15 December 2022
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