Surrogate model for gravitational wave signals from nonspinning, comparable-to large-mass-ratio black hole binaries built on black hole perturbation theory waveforms calibrated to numerical relativity

Abstract

We present a reduced-order surrogate model of gravitational waveforms from non-spinning binary black hole systems with comparable to large mass-ratio configurations. This surrogate model, BHPTNRSur1dq1e4, is trained on waveform data generated by point-particle black hole perturbation theory (ppBHPT) with mass ratios varying from 2.5 to 10,000. BHPTNRSur1dq1e4 extends an earlier waveform model, EMRISur1dq1e4, by using an updated transition-to-plunge model, covering longer durations up to 30,500 m1 (where m1 is the mass of the primary black hole), includes several more spherical harmonic modes up to = 10, and calibrates subdominant modes to numerical relativity (NR) data. In the comparable mass-ratio regime, including mass ratios as low as 2.5, the gravitational waveforms generated through ppBHPT agree surprisingly well with those from NR after this simple calibration step. We also compare our model to recent SXS and RIT NR simulations at mass ratios ranging from 15 to 32, and find the dominant quadrupolar modes agree to better than ≈ 10 −3 . We expect our model to be useful to study intermediate-mass-ratio binary systems in current and future gravitational-wave detectors.

Remnant black hole properties from numerical-relativity-informed perturbation theory and implications for waveform modelling

“…In this paper, we generate gravitational waveforms primarily using the BHPTNRSur1dq1e4 model [56]. The model can be accessed through gwsurrogate [57] or through BHPTNRSurrogate [58] package from the Black Hole Perturbation Theory Toolkit [59].…”

“…We call it BHPTNRSur1dq1e4 [56]. The model is also well tested against a handful of NR data for mass ratios ranging from q = 15 to q = 32 and is found to be accurate.…”

“…Recently, we have developed a numerical-relativity informed point-particle black-hole-perturbation theory (ppBHPT) based surrogate model for comparableto-large mass ratio binaries [55,56].…”

Ensuring Consistency between Noise and Detection in Hierarchical Bayesian Inference

“…Studies of these events (Abbott et al 2021b(Abbott et al , 2023b, combined with other multi-messenger probes (Abbott et al 2017a(Abbott et al , 2017b, have greatly improved our understanding of the cosmos, but many open questions remain. Catalogs of GW transients additionally present a relatively tractable application of hierarchical inference, as models of detector noise are generally reliable (Littenberg & Cornish 2015;Biscoveanu et al 2020; and there are first-principles models of GW signals (Buonanno & Damour 1999;Husa et al 2016;Khan et al 2016;Bohé et al 2017;Nagar et al 2018;Varma et al 2019;Ossokine et al 2020;Pratten et al 2020Pratten et al , 2021Islam et al 2022) along with the detector response (Cahillane et al 2017;Sun et al 2020). Semianalytic prescriptions (Essick 2023a) can also be accurate approximations for the behavior of real searches (e.g., Klimenko & Mitselmakher 2004;Allen 2005;Klimenko et al 2011;Allen et al 2012;Dal Canton et al 2014;Adams et al 2016;Klimenko et al 2016;Usman et al 2016;Messick et al 2017;Nitz et al 2017;Sachdev et al 2019;Davies et al 2020;Hanna et al 2020;Aubin et al 2021;Cannon et al 2021).…”

Waveform accuracy and systematic uncertainties in current gravitational wave observations

“…A term of order (v/c) 2n relative to the leading-order term is considered to be of nPN order 2. One exception to this is the family of Numerical Relativity Surrogate waveform models, constructed directly from catalogues of numerical relativity waveforms[16,17].…”