Year: 2016
Type: article
Abstract: Coalescing binary black holes are among the primary science targets for second generation ground-based gravitational wave detectors. Reliable gravitational waveform models are central to detection of such systems and subsequent parameter estimation. This paper performs a comprehensive analysis of the accuracy of recent waveform models for binary black holes with aligned spins, utilizing a new set of 84 high-accuracy numerical relativity simulations. Our analysis covers comparable mass binaries (mass-ratio $1\ensuremath{\le}q\ensuremath{\le}3$), and samples independently both black hole spins up to a dimensionless spin magnitude of 0.9 for equal-mass binaries and 0.85 for unequal mass binaries. Furthermore, we focus on the high-mass regime (total mass $\ensuremath{\gtrsim}50{M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$). The two most recent waveform models considered (PhenomD and SEOBNRv2) both perform very well for signal detection, losing less than 0.5% of the recoverable signal-to-noise ratio $\ensuremath{\rho}$, except that SEOBNRv2's efficiency drops slightly for both black hole spins aligned at large magnitude. For parameter estimation, modeling inaccuracies of the SEOBNRv2 model are found to be smaller than systematic uncertainties for moderately strong GW events up to roughly $\ensuremath{\rho}\ensuremath{\lesssim}15$. PhenomD's modeling errors are found to be smaller than SEOBNRv2's, and are generally irrelevant for $\ensuremath{\rho}\ensuremath{\lesssim}20$. Both models' accuracy deteriorates with increased mass ratio, and when at least one black hole spin is large and aligned. The SEOBNRv2 model shows a pronounced disagreement with the numerical relativity simulation in the merger phase, for unequal masses and simultaneously both black hole spins very large and aligned. Two older waveform models (PhenomC and SEOBNRv1) are found to be distinctly less accurate than the more recent PhenomD and SEOBNRv2 models. Finally, we quantify the bias expected from all four waveform models during parameter estimation for several recovered binary parameters: chirp mass, mass ratio, and effective spin.
Language: English
Subfield: Astronomy and Astrophysics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
Funders: National Science Foundation, California Institute of Technology, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, National Centre for Supercomputing Applications, Sherman Fairchild Foundation, Compute Canada, Ministère de l'Économie, de l’Innovation et des Exportations du Québec, Government of Ontario, Ontario Ministry of Economic Development and Innovation, Canada Research Chairs, University of Toronto, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Awards: Dynamical, Strong-Field Gravity, G1574664625, Collaborative Research: Theoretical-Computational Network for Extracting Astrophysics and Fundamental Physics from Multi-Messenger Observations of Compact Objects, Collaborative Research: Petascale Simulations of Core-Collapse Supernovae and Hypermassive Neutron Stars, G4498385389, G5147697952, Gravitational Radiation and Relativistic Astrophysics, G6173200009, Research in Black-Hole Physics and Relativistic Astrophysics, G7277428947, G8525594608, MRI-R2: Acquisition of a Compute Cluster for High-Fidelity Simulations of Gravitational Wave Sources -- Facilitating LIGO and Enabling Multi-Messenger Astronomy, Collaborative Research: Theoretical-Computational Network for Extracting Astrophysics and Fundamental Physics from Multi-Messenger Observations of Compact Objects
OpenAlex ID: W2265684157