Professor Leo Stein, University of Mississippi at Oxford

Title: Precision Binary Black Hole Waveform Modeling: Foundations and Recent Advances

Abstract:
Binary black hole mergers are the dominant gravitational-wave sources that LIGO/Virgo/KAGRA detect. For detection, parameter estimation, and tests of GR, we need waveform models from numerical relativity and analytical theory. I will give an overview of how to calculate these waveforms, then delve into recent advances. Future ground- and space-based GW detectors demand higher precision and require us to capture more subtle effects, such as gravitational-wave memory and nonlinear ringdown. These advances pave the way toward the precision gravitational-waveform era