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Main Authors: Evstafyeva, Tamara, Seifert, Antonia, Sperhake, Ulrich, Moore, Christopher J., Jain, Tamanna
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.25582
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author Evstafyeva, Tamara
Seifert, Antonia
Sperhake, Ulrich
Moore, Christopher J.
Jain, Tamanna
author_facet Evstafyeva, Tamara
Seifert, Antonia
Sperhake, Ulrich
Moore, Christopher J.
Jain, Tamanna
contents We explore the gravitational-wave phenomenology of equal-mass inspiralling boson-star binaries using numerical relativity simulations. In particular, we characterise the waveform differences between binary boson-star and black-hole systems across (i) the early inspiral, by matching our waveforms to post-Newtonian expressions, (ii) merger, and (iii) late ringdown, by extracting the quasi-normal mode frequencies of the remnants. We find that boson-star binaries exhibit the largest deviations from comparable binary black-hole systems during the late inspiral and merger phases. Remarkably, for a subset of these equal-mass boson-star binaries (with certain phase offsets in the scalar-field profiles) we identify the excitation of subdominant odd $m$-multipoles in the gravitational-wave emission, absent in equal-mass nonspinning black-hole binaries. Despite differences in the phenomenology of binary boson-star and black-hole signals, injections of some boson-star signals into detector noise exhibit degeneracy with current waveform approximants. Building on these results, we demonstrate how inspiral-merger-ringdown consistency tests can overcome these degeneracies.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_25582
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Lessons from binary dynamics of inspiralling equal-mass boson-star mergers
Evstafyeva, Tamara
Seifert, Antonia
Sperhake, Ulrich
Moore, Christopher J.
Jain, Tamanna
General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
We explore the gravitational-wave phenomenology of equal-mass inspiralling boson-star binaries using numerical relativity simulations. In particular, we characterise the waveform differences between binary boson-star and black-hole systems across (i) the early inspiral, by matching our waveforms to post-Newtonian expressions, (ii) merger, and (iii) late ringdown, by extracting the quasi-normal mode frequencies of the remnants. We find that boson-star binaries exhibit the largest deviations from comparable binary black-hole systems during the late inspiral and merger phases. Remarkably, for a subset of these equal-mass boson-star binaries (with certain phase offsets in the scalar-field profiles) we identify the excitation of subdominant odd $m$-multipoles in the gravitational-wave emission, absent in equal-mass nonspinning black-hole binaries. Despite differences in the phenomenology of binary boson-star and black-hole signals, injections of some boson-star signals into detector noise exhibit degeneracy with current waveform approximants. Building on these results, we demonstrate how inspiral-merger-ringdown consistency tests can overcome these degeneracies.
title Lessons from binary dynamics of inspiralling equal-mass boson-star mergers
topic General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.25582