Strong Gravity

In general relativity, the remnant black hole of a binary black hole merger emits “ringdown” radiation: a superposition of quasinormal modes with characteristic complex frequencies. The detection of more than one of these frequencies would serve as smoking-gun evidence of a black hole and would enable a test of the no-hair theorem. In this talk, I will discuss strategies for identifying quasinormal modes within simulated ringdown waveforms both in linear perturbation theory and full general relativity. I will show that a rich spectrum of modes could exist in the ringdown, including overtones, retrograde modes and nonlinear modes, and that interesting quasi-universal relationships exist between some of their amplitudes. I will also discuss the spectral instability of quasinormal modes and its potential imprints on the ringdown waveform. These results could guide the analysis of real ringdown signals detected by gravitational-wave detectors.

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Zoom link https://pitp.zoom.us/j/92002625163?pwd=bHNDVVZKYnVNTENLNXJBLzVNKzVSQT09

Anticipating the launch of several next-generation gravitational wave (GW) detectors in the 2030s, we will be able to more precisely measure spacetime ripples from binary black hole (BH) mergers in a larger parameter space. The forthcoming data will require us to develop more accurate predictions of GWs not only in General Relativity (GR) but also in theories beyond GR and diverse astrophysical environments. Black hole perturbation theory is a cornerstone for making these predictions. In recent years, there have been extensive studies of perturbations of BHs in theories beyond GR, but only for non-rotating or slowly rotating BHs. In this talk, I will present a new formalism, based on Teukolsky's seminal work in the 1970s, to study perturbations of BHs with arbitrary spin in beyond-GR theories and in more complicated astrophysical environments. I will first discuss how to derive a modified Teukolsky equation for BHs deforming perturbatively from their counterparts in GR due to beyond-GR or environmental effects and the necessary techniques to evaluate this equation. Subsequently, I will discuss some applications of this formalism. Specifically, I will prescribe utilizing this formalism to investigate the isospectrality breaking of quasinormal modes (QNMs) in beyond-GR theories, compute the QNM frequency shifts in some specific theories, and efficiently extract these shifts from observation data. Furthermore, I will also show how to apply this formalism to study extreme mass-ratio inspirals beyond GR.

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Zoom link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/99282316326?pwd=REtBSFUxdlgxUGVwZFFvVEVBVnFTUT09

While Einstein's theory of gravity is formulated in a smooth setting, the singularity theorems of Hawking and Penrose describe many physical situations in which this smoothness must eventually breakdown. In positive-definite signature, there is a highly successful theory of metric and metric-measure geometry which includes Riemannian manifolds as a special case, but permits the extraction of nonsmooth limits under curvature and dimension bounds analogous to the energy conditions in relativity: here sectional curvature is reformulated through triangle comparison, while Ricci curvature is reformulated using entropic convexity along geodesics of probability measures.This lecture explores recent progress in the development of an analogous theory in Lorentzian signature, whose ultimate goal is to provide a nonsmooth theory of gravity. We highlight how the null energy condition of Penrose admits a nonsmooth formulation as a variable lower bound on timelike Ricci curvature. We discuss an example showing the null energy condition does not survive the same sort of limits that uniform bounds on the timelike Ricci curvature respect. 

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Zoom link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/92777399316?pwd=QmNaM1J0elgyRGdmaGxCTTQxT2Y4QT09

A stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB) originates from numerous faint gravitational wave (GW) signals arising from coalescing compact binary objects. Based on the current estimated merger rate, the SGWB signal is expected to originate from non-overlapping GW waveforms where the chirping nature of individual events is expected to be preserved. In this talk, we present a novel technique, Spectrogram Correlated Stacking (or SpeCs), which goes beyond the usual cross-correlation (and to higher frequencies) by exploiting the higher-order statistics in the time-frequency domain. This method would account for the chirping nature of the individual events that comprise SGWB and enable us to extract more information from the signal due to its intrinsic non-gaussianity. We show that SpeCs improve the signal-to-noise for the detection of SGWB by a factor close to 8, compared to standard optimal cross-correlation methods which are tuned to measure only the power spectrum of the signal. SpeCs can probe beyond the power spectrum and its application to the GW data available from the current and next-generation detectors would speed up the SGWB discovery.

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Zoom link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/91002244803?pwd=a0dnMjZEYTEwSHBCVGRSeHB2Y2pJdz09

Two major approaches are used when numerically solving the Einstein field equations. The first one is to use spatial Cauchy slices and treat the system as a standard Cauchy initial value problem. Cauchy-characteristic evolution (CCE) serves as the second approach, which evolves spacetime based on null hypersurfaces. The Cauchy formulation is suitable for the strong field region but is computationally expensive to extend to the wave zone, whereas the Characteristic approach is fast in the wave zone but fails near the binary system where the null surfaces are ill-defined. By combining those two techniques — simulating the inner region with Cauchy evolution and the outer region with CCE, Cauchy-Characteristic matching (CCM) enables us to take advantage of both methods. In this talk, I present our recent implementation of CCM based on a numerical relativity code SpECTRE. I also discuss how CCM improves the accuracy of Cauchy boundary conditions — a benefit that allows us to evolve less of the wave zone in the Cauchy code without losing precision.

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Zoom link https://pitp.zoom.us/j/98246275227?pwd=QWtmUDNkMlF6bXROLzBoYXVVTGpldz09

Merging neutron stars have long been speculated to produce Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs). While this has been the standard assumption for short GRBs for decades, this was only officially confirmed with the still relatively recent detection of gravitational wave counterpart GRB 170817A. In this presentation, I will discuss how we model short GRBs and their afterglows produced by the relativistic jets launched during the merger. A recent development of interest includes the apparent confirmation of some 'long' GRBs to also follow from mergers rather than collapsing massive stars, which has implication for the prospects of future multi-messenger detections. Joint modelling of GRB / afterglow data and GW signals makes it possible to further constrain the shared model parameters between the two, most notably the orientation of the system.

Zoom link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/95551884959?pwd=bUVGVzhXK3pLb3MxMGV4ejZzUmRYdz09

Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) has produced images of the black hole in the galaxy M87 and in the center of our galaxy, and I will briefly review what we have learned from the images.  In the near future we expect that repeated visits to M87, or high fidelity images of the galactic center, will produce movies of the turbulent plasma in these sources.  The statistical properties of the movies can be predicted using state-of-the-art numerical simulations.  I will explore what information can be extracted from the movies, especially information about source inclination and black hole spin.

Zoom link TBA

In this talk, I will start by motivating the introduction of new- (quantum) physics effects in black hole spacetimes through a principled-parameterized approach. I will then discuss how these new-physics effect can affect the formation of non-singular black holes by applying the principled-parameterized approach to gravitational collapse. This will serve as a motivation to study non-singular black hole parameterizations beyond circularity. Finally, I will present how quantum gravity effects linked to these guiding principles can be traced back to observational imprints in synthetic (ng)EHT images, in particular in photon rings.

Zoom Link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/93325159463?pwd=aGlQUHJzWWg1d3hBRzAwOURGY3NFdz09

Gravitational scattering provides valuable insight into classical dynamics and is likely of fundamental importance in quantum gravity.  However, a complete framework for gravitational scattering does not yet exist.  The lack of a clear framework hinders progress; for example, different groups have reported different results for the loss of angular momentum in post-Minkowskian scattering.  In this talk I will report on recent work 2303.17124 with Compere and Wei constructing a general framework for classical gravitational scattering of finite-sized massive bodies in four spacetime dimensions.  We formulate assumptions and definitions such that the five asymptotic regions (past/future timelike/null infinity and spatial infinity) share a single Bondi-Metzner-Sachs (BMS) group of symmetries and associated charges and derive global conservation laws stating that the total change in charge is balanced by the corresponding radiative flux.  Our assumptions are compatible with all known properties of scattering spacetimes, including certain logarithmic corrections that invalidate common falloff assumptions.  Among the new implications are rigorous definitions for quantities like initial/final spin, scattering angle, and impact parameter in multi-body spacetimes, without the use of any preferred background structure.  We show that spin is supertranslation-invariant, while impact parameter is not.  To complement these derivations I will emphasize a helpful "puzzle piece" diagram that faithfully represents all five asymptotic regions, illustrating their roles in the scattering problem.

Zoom link:  https://pitp.zoom.us/j/94358515412?pwd=cUFocVNjQ1pqUmp4MDN0RmRLbjE0QT09

We are in a new era of gravitational physics in which both gravitational-wave measurements and cosmological observations can be used to test fundamental physics. Moreover, recent computational developments allow us to investigate (at present largely unexplored) regimes where the gravitational force is strong – a very promising area to search for new physics. In this talk I will overview two cases in which we aim to use strong-gravity to learn about the dark components of the universe: the interaction of binary black hole mergers with their dark matter environments and the emission and propagation of scalar gravitational waves, a distinct signature of theories aiming to explain dark energy.

Zoom link:  https://pitp.zoom.us/j/92308918921?pwd=UEk1aEt3bmRxdklqUUpSNlRocldVdz09

Highly magnetized neutron stars are a source of extreme transients observed in different bands, like the fast radio burst (FRB) and associated hard X-ray burst from the Galactic magnetar SGR 1935+2154. The origin of such outbursts, hard X-rays on the one hand and millisecond duration FRBs on the other hand, is still unknown. We present a global model for various kinds of such magnetar outbursting activities. Crustal surface motions are expected to twist the inner magnetar magnetosphere by shifting the frozen-in footpoints of magnetic field lines. We discuss criteria for the development of various instabilities of 3D twisted flux bundles in the force-free dipolar magnetospheres and compare their energetic properties to observations of magnetar X-ray flares. We then review a recently developed FRB generation mechanism in the outer magnetosphere of a magnetar. The strong magnetic pulse induced by a magnetar flare collides with the current sheet of the magnetar wind, compresses and fragments it into a self-similar chain of magnetic islands. Time-dependent plasma currents created during their collisions produce relatively narrow-band GHz emission with luminosities sufficient to explain bright extragalactic FRBs.

Zoom ink:  https://pitp.zoom.us/j/96469987183?pwd=N1UzVkh6RGZUeWV6TFZJLzk0M3VWZz09