Are moving punctures equivalent to moving black holes?

Simple item page
dc.creatorThornburg, Jonathan
dc.creatorDiener, Peter
dc.creatorPollney, Denis
dc.creatorRezzolla, Luciano
dc.creatorSchnetter, Erik
dc.creatorSeidel, Ed
dc.creatorTakahashi, Ryoji
dc.date2007-01-05
dc.date2007-05-11
dc.date.accessioned2026-07-07T10:37:12Z
dc.date.available2026-07-07T10:37:12Z
dc.descriptionWhen simulating the inspiral and coalescence of a binary black-hole system, special care needs to be taken in handling the singularities. Two main techniques are used in numerical-relativity simulations: A first and more traditional one ``excises'' a spatial neighbourhood of the singularity from the numerical grid on each spacelike hypersurface. A second and more recent one, instead, begins with a ``puncture'' solution and then evolves the full 3-metric, including the singular point. In the continuum limit, excision is justified by the light-cone structure of the Einstein equations and, in practice, can give accurate numerical solutions when suitable discretizations are used. However, because the field variables are non-differentiable at the puncture, there is no proof that the moving-punctures technique is correct, particularly in the discrete case. To investigate this question we use both techniques to evolve a binary system of equal-mass non-spinning black holes. We compare the evolution of two curvature 4-scalars with proper time along the invariantly-defined worldline midway between the two black holes, using Richardson extrapolation to reduce the influence of finite-difference truncation errors. We find that the excision and moving-punctures evolutions produce the same invariants along that worldline, and thus the same spacetimes throughout that worldline's causal past. This provides convincing evidence that moving-punctures are indeed equivalent to moving black holes.
dc.description4 pages, 3 eps color figures; v2 = major revisions to introduction & conclusions based on referee comments, but no change in analysis or results
dc.identifierhttps://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0701038
dc.identifierhttp://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0701038
dc.identifierClass.Quant.Grav.24:3911-3918,2007
dc.identifierdoi:10.1088/0264-9381/24/15/009
dc.identifier.urihttp://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/180298
dc.subjectGeneral Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
dc.titleAre moving punctures equivalent to moving black holes?
dc.typetext

Files

Collections

arXiv