Brian D. Farris, Roman Gold, Vasileios Paschalidis, Zachariah B. Etienne, Stuart L. Shapiro
We present results from the first fully general relativistic, magnetohydrodynamic (GRMHD) simulations of an equal-mass black hole binary (BHBH) in a magnetized, circumbinary accretion disk. We simulate both the pre and post-decoupling phases of a BHBH-disk system and both "cooling" and "no-cooling" gas flows. Prior to decoupling, the competition between the binary tidal torques and the effective viscous torques due to MHD turbulence depletes the disk interior to the binary orbit. However, it also induces a two-stream accretion flow and mildly relativistic polar outflows from the BHs. Following decoupling, the accretion rate is reduced, while the EM luminosities peak near merger due to shock heating. This investigation, though preliminary, previews more detailed GRMHD simulations we plan to perform in anticipation of future, simultaneous detections of gravitational and electromagnetic radiation from a merging BHBH-disk system.
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http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.3354
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