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General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology, gr-qc
Abstract:
The dynamics of merging black hole binaries with small mass-ratios (SMR) can
be expressed as a series in the symmetric mass-ratio, the post-adiabatic
expansion. Using numerical relativity simulations, we compute the first three
terms in this series for quasicircular non-spinning binaries. We recover the
leading term predicted by SMR perturbation theory, and obtain a robust
prediction of the 1-post-adiabatic term. The 2-post-adiabatic term is found to
be small, indicating that the 1PA approximation may be quite accurate even for
nearly comparable mass binaries. We also estimate the range of applicability
for SMR and post-Newtonian series for non-spinning, quasi-circular inspirals.
