Abstract
Measurements of black-hole spins are of crucial importance to fulfill the promise of gravitational-wave astronomy. On the astrophysics side, spins are perhaps the cleanest indicator of black-hole evolutionary processes, thus providing a preferred way to discriminate how LIGO's black holes form. On the relativity side, spins are responsible for peculiar dynamical phenomena (from precessional modulations in the long inspiral to gravitational-wave recoils at merger) which encode precious information on the underlying astrophysical processes. I present some examples to explore this deep and fascinating interplay between spin dynamics (relativity) and environmental effects (astrophysics). Black-hole spins indeed hide remarkable surprises on both fronts: morphologies, resonances, constraints on supernova kicks, multiple merger generations and more...These findings were presented at 12th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves, held on July 9-14, 2017 in Pasadena, CA, USA.
Highlights
The second-generation gravitational-wave (GW) detectors Advanced LIGO and Virgo are taking us into the age of observational strong-field gravity
The detections of black-hole (BH) binaries has become routine with 4.87 events observed during Advanced LIGO/Virgo first and second observing runs (4 confirmed detections [1, 2, 3, 4] and 1 candidates with 87% probability of being of astrophysical origin [5])
BH spins are precious observables to infer the astrophysics of BH binaries from GW observations
Summary
The second-generation gravitational-wave (GW) detectors Advanced LIGO and Virgo are taking us into the age of observational strong-field gravity. The detections of black-hole (BH) binaries has become routine with 4.87 events observed during Advanced LIGO/Virgo first and second observing runs (4 confirmed detections [1, 2, 3, 4] and 1 candidates with 87% probability of being of astrophysical origin [5]). These observations are giving us unique insights on a sector of the Universe we hardly knew existed.
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