Hunting for Universal Relations and Underlying Structures in Binary Black Hole Mergers

by Dr Tousif Islam (UC Santa Barbara)

Friday 22 Aug 2025, 14:30 → 15:30 Asia/Kolkata

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With about 200 binary black hole mergers detected, gravitational-wave (GW) astronomy is transforming our understanding of astrophysics, including star formation rates, binary formation channels, the neutron star–black hole mass gap, and pair-instability supernovae. Detecting and analyzing GW signals relies on accurate radiation models and efficient template banks for matched filtering. While traditional approaches rely on brute-force modeling and template bank construction, my goal is to identify and exploit symmetries and leading-order relations between radiative quantities—and to discover new ones. Using state-of-the-art numerical relativity and black hole perturbation theory simulations, I will demonstrate several symmetries, universal relations, and hidden structures in the binary black hole problem, particularly for eccentric systems. I will then show how these findings are advancing theoretical understanding, improving modeling, and enabling more efficient data analysis within the community.