Black hole spectroscopy of collapsing and merging neutron stars

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Steppohn, Oliver, Völkel, Sebastian H., Dietrich, Tim
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Steppohn, Oliver
Völkel, Sebastian H.
Dietrich, Tim
author_facet Steppohn, Oliver
Völkel, Sebastian H.
Dietrich, Tim
contents Black hole spectroscopy is an important pillar when studying gravitational waves from black holes and enables tests of general relativity. Most of the gravitational-wave signals observed over the last decade originate from binary black hole systems. Binary neutron star or black hole-neutron star systems are rarer but of particular interest for the next-generation ground-based gravitational-wave detectors. These events offer the exciting possibility of studying matter effects on the ringdown of "dirty black holes". In this work, we ask the question: Does matter matter? Using numerical-relativity, we simulate a wide range of collapsing neutron stars producing matter environments, both in isolated scenarios and in binary mergers. Qualitatively, the resulting ringdown signals can be classified into "clean", "modified", and "distorted" cases, depending on the amount of matter that is present. We apply standard strategies for extracting quasinormal modes of clean signals, using both theory-agnostic and theory-specific assumptions. Even in the presence of matter, possible modifications of quasinormal modes seem to be dominated by ringdown modeling systematics. We find that incorporating multiple quasinormal modes allows one to drastically reduce mismatches and errors in estimating the final black hole mass at early times. If not treated carefully, deviations in the fundamental quasinormal mode might artificially be overestimated and falsely attributed to the presence of matter or violations of general relativity.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2508_15534
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Black hole spectroscopy of collapsing and merging neutron stars
Steppohn, Oliver
Völkel, Sebastian H.
Dietrich, Tim
General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
Black hole spectroscopy is an important pillar when studying gravitational waves from black holes and enables tests of general relativity. Most of the gravitational-wave signals observed over the last decade originate from binary black hole systems. Binary neutron star or black hole-neutron star systems are rarer but of particular interest for the next-generation ground-based gravitational-wave detectors. These events offer the exciting possibility of studying matter effects on the ringdown of "dirty black holes". In this work, we ask the question: Does matter matter? Using numerical-relativity, we simulate a wide range of collapsing neutron stars producing matter environments, both in isolated scenarios and in binary mergers. Qualitatively, the resulting ringdown signals can be classified into "clean", "modified", and "distorted" cases, depending on the amount of matter that is present. We apply standard strategies for extracting quasinormal modes of clean signals, using both theory-agnostic and theory-specific assumptions. Even in the presence of matter, possible modifications of quasinormal modes seem to be dominated by ringdown modeling systematics. We find that incorporating multiple quasinormal modes allows one to drastically reduce mismatches and errors in estimating the final black hole mass at early times. If not treated carefully, deviations in the fundamental quasinormal mode might artificially be overestimated and falsely attributed to the presence of matter or violations of general relativity.
title Black hole spectroscopy of collapsing and merging neutron stars
topic General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.15534