By: Shilpa Kastha, Stamatis Vretinaris, Daniel Pook-Kolb, Badri Krishnan
An important question in binary black hole mergers is to connect properties of the remnant black hole to those of the two initial black holes. These properties include not only the final mass and spin of the remnant, but also higher multipoles and answers to other questions such as, for a given initial configuration, which quasi-normal modes of the final black hole are excited, and what are the amplitudes of these modes? Such questions have t... more
An important question in binary black hole mergers is to connect properties of the remnant black hole to those of the two initial black holes. These properties include not only the final mass and spin of the remnant, but also higher multipoles and answers to other questions such as, for a given initial configuration, which quasi-normal modes of the final black hole are excited, and what are the amplitudes of these modes? Such questions have thus far been primarily addressed through a study of the emitted gravitational wave signal. In this paper we consider a different alternative, namely using quasi-local black hole horizons themselves to establish the link between the initial and final states. Recent work has elucidated the behavior of black hole horizons in a merger. Cusps forming in such otherwise smoothly evolving horizons have been shown to play a central role in connecting the two initially separate black holes with the final remnant. In the present work, we will discuss from a numerical perspective how such cusps form in detail for the head-on collision of two non-spinning black holes. We show how the mass and higher mass multipole moments behave at the cusp and suggest a phenomenological model. less
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By: Matthew Debono, Jackson Levi Said, Gabriel Farrugia
The LCDM model has been presented with a number of cosmic tensions in the face of precision cosmological data, suggesting the presence of a dynamical dark energy component. In this context, we investigate the cosmology arising from a generalisation of Brans-Dicke theory, with a non-minimally coupled scalar field characterising deviations from standard general relativity, and having a non-canonical kinetic term. By reformulating the field equa... more
The LCDM model has been presented with a number of cosmic tensions in the face of precision cosmological data, suggesting the presence of a dynamical dark energy component. In this context, we investigate the cosmology arising from a generalisation of Brans-Dicke theory, with a non-minimally coupled scalar field characterising deviations from standard general relativity, and having a non-canonical kinetic term. By reformulating the field equations into an autonomous set of dynamical equations, we use the methods of dynamical systems to investigate the equilibrium states of the system and their stability for a set of widely-used potentials, namely the constant, power-law, and exponential potentials, with the flow visualized using bounded phase portraits. Furthermore, we investigate the physical meaning of the critical points, and we find viable solutions that can reproduce the characteristics of the $Λ$CDM model at background level for each of the three potentials. Furthermore, in each case, we observe that the dynamical behaviour differs noticeably from that observed in other scalar-tensor models due to the non-minimal coupling and non-canonical field, despite using similarly defined dynamical variables. less
By: Hernando Quevedo
In this review, we establish the mathematical framework of geometrothermodynamics (GTD) as a formalism capable of describing non-extensive, quasi-homogeneous, self-gravitating systems in a Legendre-invariant manner. We argue that the fundamental equations of black holes are quasi-homogeneous functions, a property that invalidates the standard Euler identity of laboratory thermodynamics. We derive the metrics for the equilibrium manifold and a... more
In this review, we establish the mathematical framework of geometrothermodynamics (GTD) as a formalism capable of describing non-extensive, quasi-homogeneous, self-gravitating systems in a Legendre-invariant manner. We argue that the fundamental equations of black holes are quasi-homogeneous functions, a property that invalidates the standard Euler identity of laboratory thermodynamics. We derive the metrics for the equilibrium manifold and analyze their curvature singularities for the Reissner-Nordström, Kerr, and Kerr-Newman black holes. Furthermore, we establish a direct correspondence between the curvature singularities of the equilibrium space and phase transitions, as determined by the divergences of the corresponding heat capacities. less
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